Reference
Glossary
Plain-English definitions for the terms used across this site. If something on the site uses a word that isn't here, please tell us.
- Area for improvement
- A finding by HMICFRS that a force needs to improve in a specific area. Less serious than a cause of concern, and it can remain open across more than one inspection cycle.
- BAILII
- British and Irish Legal Information Institute. Free access to UK and Irish case law and statutes.
- Calls for evidence
- Open invitations from Parliament or government to submit written evidence on a topic before policy or legislation is drafted.
- Cause of concern
- HMICFRS's most serious inspection finding. An accelerated cause of concern is issued ahead of the full inspection report where the inspectorate judges the issue too urgent to wait.
- Centre for Women's Justice (CWJ)
- Legal charity that holds the state to account for failures to protect women and girls. Led the 2020 Super-Complaint on police-perpetrated domestic abuse.
- DARVO
- Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender. A pattern identified by Jennifer Freyd (1997) in which a perpetrator denies, attacks the person raising the concern, and recasts themselves as the victim.
- Disclosure failure
- When the prosecution does not disclose evidence to the defence that it is required by law to disclose. A leading cause of wrongful convictions.
- Engage
- HMICFRS's former enhanced monitoring process for forces with serious or persistent performance problems. Retired in May 2026 and replaced by the Policing Performance System. Referred to on this site only as historical record.
- FACETS
- A framework from facets.digital with six lenses for analysing how a story is framed: framing, archetypes, collective belief, expectation, themes, symbolism.
- Find Case Law
- The National Archives' free, official archive of UK judgments (Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, High Court and major tribunals).
- FOI
- Freedom of Information. The right, under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, to request recorded information held by public authorities.
- Gross misconduct
- Conduct so serious that, if proven, dismissal without notice could be justified.
- Hansard
- The official verbatim report of proceedings in the UK Parliament.
- HMICFRS
- His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services. The independent inspectorate for policing in England and Wales.
- Institutional betrayal
- Term coined by Smith and Freyd (2014) for the harm caused when an institution a person depends on fails to prevent or respond to wrongdoing committed within it.
- IOPC
- Independent Office for Police Conduct. Handles the most serious complaints and conduct matters about police in England and Wales.
- Malicious prosecution
- A civil claim against a prosecutor who brought a case without reasonable and probable cause, and with malice, that ended in the claimant's favour.
- Misconduct
- Conduct that, if proven, would justify disciplinary action under the Police (Conduct) Regulations 2020.
- PACE
- Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. The framework that governs police powers in England and Wales: stop, search, arrest, detention, interview.
- PEEL
- HMICFRS's framework for inspecting forces: Police Effectiveness, Efficiency and Legitimacy. Each force gets a grade in each area.
- Police Performance Framework
- A Home Office framework that sets force targets on neighbourhood policing levels, 999 response times and incident response times. Its data is one of the inputs to Policing Performance System level decisions.
- Policing Performance System
- The framework HMICFRS uses to assign every police force in England and Wales a performance level from One to Four. Introduced in April 2026, replacing the previous Scan and Engage monitoring arrangements. Levels are decided three times a year by the Policing Performance Monitoring Group.
- RAG
- Red, Amber, Green status indicator. Used on this site to summarise a monitor at a glance.
- Super-Complaint
- A statutory complaint about a feature, or combination of features, of policing in England and Wales that is harming the public. Brought by designated bodies.
- Trauma-informed
- An approach that recognises the prevalence of trauma and seeks to avoid re-traumatisation in the design of services, communication and process.
- Victim Personal Statement (VPS)
- A statement that a victim of crime can make to the court describing how the crime has affected them.
- VPA
- Victims and Prisoners Act 2024. Sets out the rights of victims of crime in England and Wales, including the Victims' Code.
- WhatDoTheyKnow
- mySociety's free service for sending FOI requests and publishing the responses.