Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022

9 Powers to collaborate and plan to prevent and reduce serious violence

(1) Two or more specified authorities may collaborate with each other to prevent and reduce serious violence in a relevant area.

(2) The power conferred on specified authorities by subsection (1) includes a power to plan together to exercise their functions so as to prevent and reduce serious violence in a relevant area.

(3) In particular, the specified authorities may—

(a) identify the kinds of serious violence that occur in a relevant area,

(b) identify the causes of serious violence in the area, and

(c) prepare and implement a strategy for exercising their functions to prevent and reduce serious violence in the area.

(4) In preparing a strategy under this section for a relevant area, the specified authorities preparing the strategy must ensure that the following are consulted—

(a) every other specified authority for the area;

(b) each educational authority for the area;

(c) each prison authority for the area;

(d) each youth custody authority for the area.

(5) A strategy under this section for a relevant area may specify actions to be carried out by—

(a) an educational authority for the area,

(b) a prison authority for the area, or

(c) a youth custody authority for the area.

See section 15 for further provision about the duties of such authorities in relation to such actions.

(6) In preparing a strategy under this section for a relevant area, the specified authorities for the area may invite participation from—

(a) in the case of a strategy for a relevant area in England, an eligible person for the time being prescribed by order of the Secretary of State under section 5(3) of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998;

(b) in the case of a strategy for a relevant area in Wales, an eligible person for the time being prescribed by order of the Welsh Ministers under section 5(3) of that Act;

(c) in the case of a strategy for a relevant area partly in England and partly in Wales, an eligible person for the time being prescribed by order of the Secretary of State or the Welsh Ministers under section 5(3) of that Act.

(7) For the purposes of subsection (6), an eligible person is—

(a) where a person is prescribed in terms of a description which includes a connection to a local government area, a person of that description with such a connection to a local government area all or part of which coincides with or falls within the relevant area, or

(b) a person prescribed in terms that do not refer to a connection with a local government area.

In this subsection “local government area” has the same meaning as in section 5 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 (see subsection (4) of that section).

(8) Once a strategy has been prepared under this section for a relevant area, the specified authorities for the area—

(a) must publish the strategy,

(b) may keep the strategy under review, and

(c) may from time to time prepare and implement a revised strategy.

(9) A strategy under this section must not include any material that the specified authorities consider—

(a) might jeopardise the safety of any person,

(b) might prejudice the prevention or detection of crime or the investigation or prosecution of an offence, or

(c) might compromise the security of, or good order or discipline within, an institution of a kind mentioned in the first column of a table in Schedule 2.

(10) The Secretary of State may by regulations make further provision for or in connection with the publication and dissemination of a strategy under this section.

(11) References in subsections (4) to (10) to a strategy under this section include a revised strategy.

(12) This section does not affect any power of a specified authority to collaborate or plan apart from this section.

(13) In this Chapter “relevant area”, in relation to a specified authority, educational authority, prison authority or youth custody authority means an area made up of—

(a) all or part of a local government area for which it is a specified authority, educational authority, prison authority or youth custody authority, and

(b) all or part of one or more other local government areas (regardless of whether, in the case of a specified authority or educational authority, it is also a specified authority or educational authority for the other area or areas).

(14) For further provisions about the interpretation of this section, see—

(a) section 11 and Schedule 1 (specified authorities and local government areas);

(b) section 12 and Schedule 2 (educational, prison and youth custody authorities);

(c) section 13 (preventing and reducing serious violence).