91̽»¨

Grant details

Cabinet Office Evaluation Accelerator Fund

Project start and end dates

01/09/22 - 31/03/25

Research team members

• PI: 
• CI: Dr Matthew Bacon
• The team has over twenty members

Background and aims of the project

This research project is an evaluation of the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of police-led diversion (PDD) schemes for drug-involved suspects. A team of academic, policing, health and service user partners will evaluate PDD schemes that are already operating in three areas; Durham, Thames Valley and West Midlands. People on the schemes are assessed, then referred to education, treatment or support (as needed) with an ‘out of court disposal’, like a warning, which does not create a criminal record.

We will use data already collected by the police, NHS, and drug treatment services to assess the impacts of diversion on crime, hospitalisations and engagement with drug treatment. We will compare the outcomes for people eligible for diversion in the three areas to the outcomes of similar people in matched areas which do not yet use PDD (Humberside, Hampshire and Greater Manchester). In order to learn how PDD schemes work in practice, we will carry out interviews and focus groups with the people who work with these schemes, including police officers, drug treatment providers, service users and their families. We will also examine how equitable the effects of PDD are (e.g. by ethnicity and gender).

Partners in the project bring a range of skills and include the Universities of 91̽»¨, York and Loughborough, the Open University, Bradford Institute for Health Research, the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities, the Office of the West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner, Thames Valley Police, Durham Police and the charity Use Voice.

People with direct experience of being policed play a key role in this project. They have collaborated in designing the research, especially in creating our plans for research with service users. They will be equal partners in the collection and analysis of data. They will help share the results and our work on translating them into changes in policy and practice.