Complaints involving allegations of homophobia

Response

Cases relevant to your request are recorded as one of the following:

 

• Complaint – received from members of the public against officers/staff;
• Conduct – originating from within the force.

 

A single case may contain multiple allegations, and each allegation can be linked to multiple subjects.

 

We have identified relevant information in different ways for the timeframe of your request, based on the way the information is held over that timeframe.

 

From April 2020 onwards, complaints and conduct matters are recorded using the IOPC Guidance on capturing data about police complaints. Data for this timeframe has been identified via a search for the allegation subtype F9) Sexual Orientation.

For the period prior to April 2020, the allegation subtype was not in use, so all allegations recorded under umbrella type F) Discriminatory Behaviour were manually reviewed to identify any relevant cases.

 

Questions 1 and 2:

 

The table below shows the number of complaints and conduct cases recorded in each year that meet the criteria described above.

 

The first column shows a distinct number of cases and subjects – this means if one subject has had more than one case against them in the same year, each of those cases will be counted and included in the total for that year. The count adds the total number of subjects per case. For example, if a case is linked to three subjects, this will count as 3.

 

The second column shows a distinct count of allegation reference. There can be multiple allegations on one case, and one allegation can be linked to multiple subjects.

 

Note that there are no conducts that describe allegations of homophobia, homophobic behaviour, or discrimination based on sexual orientation in 2019 or 2020, and no complaints of this type in 2019.

Year	Distinct Count of Case Reference & Person ID	Distinct Count of Allegation Reference
Complaint:
2020	1	1
2021	2	2
2022	11	7
2023	7	4
2024	7	6
2025	4	2
Conduct:
2021	3	4
2022	1	1
2023	4	4
2024	4	7
2025	2	2
Total	46	40

 

3. Where possible, please break down the outcome of the complaint and whether it was upheld

 

For the cases and allegations above that are now finalised, the result of these allegations are broken down below.

 

Case Type	Allegation Result Description	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025
Complaint	no further action required	0	1	0	0	0	3
	the service provided was acceptable	1	1	10	6	7	1
	the service provided was not acceptable	0	0	1	0	0	0
Conduct	case to answer	0	3	1	2	3	0
	discontinuance	0	0	0	1	0	0
	no case to answer	0	0	0	1	0	0