By Ethan Davies

A much-delayed report into how Greater Manchester Police (GMP) has treated women in custody will be published next month, it's been confirmed. 

The Baird Review was triggered by a series of allegations made against the force from multiple women who came forward last summer. They alleged that officers performed unjustified strip searches while in custody.

That led to mayor Andy Burnham and deputy mayor Kate Green commissioning the review, led by Dame Vera Baird — a former police and crime commissioner and national victims' commissioner. It was open to a much wider group of people than three original complainants.

Initially, the report was supposed to be released in autumn 2023, but this was then revised to 'by the end of the mayoral term' in late January. However, 'due diligence' checks took longer than anticipated. 

That meant by mid-February, publication was delayed until after the May 2 election. Now, the mayor has confirmed a publication date has been set, speaking at a Greater Manchester Police, Fire, and Crime panel meeting on Tuesday (May 14).

Deputy mayor of Greater Manchester Kate Green commissioned the review, alongside Mayor Andy Burnham (Image - UK Parliament)

"I thought it was important to provide an update on the report into custody in Greater Manchester and the treatment of women in custody," he said.

"[High profile media reports] led to a discussion where we agreed to approach Dame Vera Baird to conduct a review of the treatment of women in custody. We opened it up to other people, not just those in the media reports.

"A date of June 10 has been set to publish the report and stakeholders have been informed."

The meeting also saw deputy mayor Kate Green re-confirmed in her role, with Mr Burnham adding; "I want someone who fulfils the deputy mayor role to share my approach to policing — and I am still 'tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime'… There's no better person to lead us into that era than Kate Green."

(GMP headquarters image by David Dixon, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0)

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