Gwent Police

Examples of useful requests

Ideas of requests people commonly send to Gwent Police. Success is not guaranteed — exemptions and cost limits may apply.

• Number of stop-and-searches by outcome last year
• Spending on Taser equipment in the last financial year
• Policy on body-worn video retention
• Number of complaints upheld in the last 12 months

What you may be able to request

Some information categories are based on the authority's published responsibilities and may not yet have been confirmed through an FOI response.

What the Police Information Map is establishing

The map is built in stages. Before a statistical request can be written properly, we need to know what exists and what a force's systems can actually do.

1. 1What police systems exist
2. 2What information they record
3. 3What fields and categories can be searched
4. 4What fields and categories can be statistically reported
5. 5Whether reporting requires manual review
6. 6Whether fields are mandatory, conditional or optional
7. 7What statistical FOI requests can then be constructed

This Gwent Police response matters because it gives unusually clear information about which fields are searchable and which can be used in statistical reporting.

What systems are being used?

Searchable crime information

What can potentially be filtered for suspects?

Green means Gwent Police confirmed the capability. Amber means it confirmed the capability but placed a limitation on the answer.

• Age✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Age band✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Sex✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Nationality✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Ethnicity✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Country of birth✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Immigration status✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Occupation✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Vulnerability markers✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Repeat offender markers✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

Gwent Police attributed each of these capabilities to NICHE RMS. They do not tell us how consistently any individual field is completed.

What can potentially be filtered for victims?

• Age⚠QUALIFIED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

  ⚠ Gwent Police states this is not recorded in STORM.

• Age band⚠QUALIFIED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

  ⚠ Gwent Police states this is not recorded in STORM.

• Sex⚠QUALIFIED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

  ⚠ Gwent Police states this is not recorded in STORM.

• Nationality⚠QUALIFIED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

  ⚠ Not recorded in STORM, and Gwent Police states nationality is not routinely recorded for victims.

• Ethnicity⚠QUALIFIED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

  ⚠ Gwent Police states this is not recorded in STORM.

• Vulnerability markers✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

• Repeat victim markers✓CONFIRMED

  NICHE RMS — searchable and reportable

Nationality

Reporting capability

Why this matters

The foundation model

1. 🧱 System

   What software holds the information?

   ↓
2. 🧱 Field

   What categories exist?

   ↓
3. 🧱 Population

   How consistently are they completed?

   ↓
4. 🧱 Search

   Can authorised users search them?

   ↓
5. 🧱 Report

   Can statistical reporting use them?

   ↓
6. 🧱 Combination

   Can multiple fields be queried together?

   ↓
7. 🧱 Data

   Construct targeted statistical FOIs.

Brick by brick, the foundations are being laid.

Where the investigation goes next

These questions were not answered by FOI 2026/29880. They are recorded as open questions, not assumptions.

• ❓What values exist under Immigration Status?
• ❓How is Asylum Seeker Status represented?
• ❓How is Refugee Status represented?
• ❓What values exist for Visa Status?
• ❓Are these dedicated fields, markers or selectable values?
• ❓Which fields are mandatory?
• ❓Which fields are conditionally mandatory?
• ❓Which fields are optional?
• ❓How consistently are the fields populated?
• ❓What Business Intelligence platform is used?
• ❓Which combinations of fields can be statistically reported?

Next step: targeted follow-up FOI

Future statistical potential

Once the structure and limitations of the data are properly established, future FOI requests may be able to test whether statistics can be produced across combinations of categories.

These are labelled possible future queries. Gwent Police has not confirmed that every combination of fields can be produced.

Force comparison record

These are the comparison fields recorded for Gwent Police in the Police Information Map, so forces can be compared on the same basis as more responses arrive.

Same platform. Different forces. Now we compare.

NICHE is now appearing in responses from more than one police force. That makes structured comparison possible for the first time.

1. Force
   ↓
2. Records-management system
   ↓
3. Field existence
   ↓
4. Field terminology
   ↓
5. Field population
   ↓
6. Search capability
   ↓
7. Reporting capability

Gwent Police compared with North Wales Police

Both forces have now answered the same request. Only evidence already published on PublicAudit.uk from each force's own FOI response is used here.

What we now know, and what we still don't

The PublicAudit evidence standard

Confirmed

Explicitly stated by the authority.

Qualified

Confirmed with an important limitation.

Not recorded

The authority explicitly states it is not recorded.

Unknown

The response does not establish the answer.

Withheld

The authority says the information falls within the request but has applied an exemption.

• Searchable is never converted into routinely recorded.
• Searchable is never converted into reportable unless the response supports it.
• Forces using the same software are never assumed to configure their systems identically.
• Immigration status is never inferred from nationality or country of birth.

Mapping progress

1. 10 August 2026
   Response received

   Gwent Police confirmed it uses NICHE RMS for crime, custody, intelligence and case management records, and STORM for incident logs. Crime type, offence code, outcome, dates and location are searchable and reportable. Suspect and victim fields including sex, ethnicity, nationality and country of birth are searchable, but the force stated nationality is not routinely recorded for suspects or victims — searchable is not the same as routinely recorded. Immigration-related fields exist in NICHE. The force refused to release its search and reporting documentation, including data dictionaries and reporting guides, under section 43(2) (commercial interests).