This complaint was submitted following concerns regarding Gwent police’ approach to the recording of Lost or Stolen (LoS) vehicles of the Police National Computer (PNC) Lost or Stolen (LoS) register.
It appeared Gwent was frequently failing to ‘confirm‘ some notifications of the PNC. As a result:
- the DVLA was not notified of the Vehicle Registration Mark’s (VRM) ‘stolen’ status and
- after 6 weeks, if still not ‘confirmed’, the LoS marker would be automatically removed from the PNC LoS register; the LoS entry would be ‘weeded‘ off PNC.
Further reading:
- What is ‘weeding’?.
- The ‘extent of weeding‘ – a summary.
- Purpose: Oversight, assurance, and policy review – 33 page pdf submission
05/01/2026 report to the Gwent Police Professional Standards Department.
As of 17/07/2026 the constabulary has failed to act meaningfully upon the complaint – the continuity of events can be read here.
Formal Complaints:
PNC Lost/Stolen “Weeding”,
Misrepresentation, and
Governance Failure
Statutory basis: Schedule 3, Police Reform Act 2002
The following comprises a schedule of outstanding and new complaints
PURPOSE AND REGISTRATION REQUIREMENT
This document raises multiple heads of complaint concerning:
- integrity and accuracy of representations made by Gwent Police staff,
- improper handling of complaints and regulatory engagement,
- systemic failure in the management of PNC Lost/Stolen (LoS) markers,
- repeat operational failure despite claimed remediation.
Each head below requires formal recording and outcome determination under Schedule 3 of the
Police Reform Act 2002.
No part of this document should be treated as informal correspondence, service feedback, or
resolved historic matter.
This complaint is force-specific and evidence-based. It should not be characterised as a coordinated campaign or treated as connected to other forces for the purpose of limiting engagement. Each head arises from documented events and admissions within Gwent Police
BACKGROUND FACTS (UNDISPUTED)
- In May 2024, I notified Gwent Police of automatic removal (“weeding”) of unconfirmed PNC LoS markers.
- Gwent Police later asserted that the issue had already been identified internally prior to my notification.
- Gwent Police advised that a new process – ‘confirmation at creation’ – had eliminated weeding.
- In November 2025, a further stolen vehicle marker was weeded after six weeks.
- The error was detected externally, not by internal monitoring.
- Gwent Police later confirmed:
a. unconfirmed markers still existed,
b. DAF monitoring had been discontinued,
c. confirmation relied on unsupervised manual action.
C 1. Misrepresentation of Chronology and Credit
Gwent Police stated that the weeding issue had been identified internally, and that remedial attention had occurred, before I raised the matter. I raised the matter in May 2024.
FOIA disclosures demonstrate this to be inaccurate. The earliest evidenced internal engagement with the weeding issue is [GM01] involvement, which post-dates my May 2024 notification.
No documentary evidence has been produced showing any internal identification, action, or awareness of the weeding issue prior to my May 2024 disclosure. Indeed, the evidence produced by Gwent to date conveys the inspector considering the issue months after my raising the issue, on WDTK, in the public domain during May 2024
Complaint:
This constitutes a material misrepresentation of chronology and attribution; a clear distortion of evidenced fact.
Required determinations:
- Evidence that, prior to my raising weeding in May 2024, the Gwent [GW01] had addressed the issue
- Was the statement accurate?
- If not, why was it made?
- What checks were undertaken before asserting it?
Requested outcome:
Recorded outcome determination & rationale; where applicable, learning/debrief and supervisory action.
C 2. Improper Inducement During Complaint Handling
During a recorded conversation with [GW02] of PSD, I was encouraged to withdraw or de-emphasise my complaint in favour of maintaining a working relationship, with reference to apologies and future cooperation.
See: Attachment 1. coercion [restricted]
Complaint:
This amounts to an inducement incompatible with impartial complaint handling.
Required determinations:
- Was this assessed against IOPC statutory guidance?
- Was the conduct appropriate?
- Why was this issue not substantively addressed in the written outcome?
Requested outcome:
Recorded outcome determination & rationale; where applicable, learning/debrief and supervisory action.
C 3. Failure to Register and Determine a Complaint Against a Complaint Handler
My allegation concerning inducement by Inspector Jenkins was not addressed, despite later assertions that it had been resolved. See:
Attachment 2. 20/12/2024 from Gwent [GW02] [restricted]
The above does not address the complaint about Mr Jenkins (the author of the letter) and:
Attachment 3. 25/04/2025 from Gwent [GW03] 11 [restricted]
Which seeks to convince that [GW02] letter of 20/12/2024 does address coercion.
Complaint:
A complaint against the complaint handler was neither independently assessed nor determined.
Required determinations:
- Was this allegation formally recorded?
- If so, what was the outcome?
- If not, why not?
Requested outcome:
Recorded outcome determination & rationale; where applicable, learning/debrief and supervisory action.
C 4. Misrepresentation to the Information Commissioner
Gwent Police informed the ICO that I had submitted eight FOIA requests in seven months. The ICO found this to be untrue and confirmed only three requests existed. See;
Attachment 4. ICO DN Evidence
The DN can be found linked here: https://ico.org.uk/action-weve-taken/decision-notices/2025/08/ic-355444-p4t3/
Complaint:
This represents a failure of accuracy and candour in regulatory engagement.
Required determinations:
- Who authorised the representation?
- What verification was undertaken?
- Why was no correction issued?
Requested outcome:
Recorded outcome determination & rationale; where applicable, learning/debrief and supervisory action.
C 5. Systemic Failure in PNC Governance (Weeding)
Despite assurances that weeding had been eliminated, a further unconfirmed LoS marker was weeded in November 2025.
Gwent Police confirmed:
- DAF monitoring had been removed,
- reliance placed on manual confirmation,
- no effective supervision existed.
See:
Attachment 5. Failure to oversee [restricted]
Complaint:
The remedial process was ineffective, unsupervised, and failed.
Required determinations:
- Who authorised removal of monitoring?
- What risk assessment was conducted?
- Why was failure not detected internally?
Requested outcome:
Recorded outcome determination & rationale; where applicable, learning/debrief and supervisory action.
C 6. Extent of Gwent Weeding
The act of weeding has been well documented to Gwent police. However, in support of my considerations, concerns and questions, I have attached a report following consideration of the issue – THE EXTENT OF WEEDING. This report examines the systemic under-recording of stolen vehicles within the DVLA register, arising from police processes governing the confirmation and subsequent deletion (“weeding”) of unconfirmed stolen-vehicle markers on the Police National Computer (PNC).
Key findings:
- A significant and persistent discrepancy exists between police-recorded vehicle theft figures and DVLA stolen-vehicle notifications.
- Analysis of available data indicates that DVLA totals are materially lower than police-recorded theft totals, even after allowing for timing and reporting differences.
- The scale of the discrepancy appears consistent with the routine deletion of unconfirmed stolen-vehicle records i.e. weeding, rather than isolated error.
A weeded PNC LoS marker creates a credible risk that downstream notifications and checks (including DVLA-facing processes) are incomplete or delayed.
- I seek confirmation of Gwent’s DVLA notification workflow for LoS reports and whether ‘unconfirmed’ status has prevented all or some of the DVLA notifications identified
- Has weeding caused VRMs to not be recorded LoS at the DVLA and ultimately on the PNC?
Required reconciliation exercise
Please provide Gwent’s internal reconciliation for 2024 and 2025 between:
(a) Niche recorded stolen vehicle crimes,
(b) PNC LoS markers created, confirmed, and weeded,
(c) any DAF ‘will be deleted’ alerts generated, actioned, and unactioned, and
(d) notifications transmitted to DVLA (and any failure reports).
If you contend these datasets cannot be reconciled, please explain why not and identify the system owner for each dataset.
A weeded VRM indicates a lack of attention to the crime for six weeks and creates a credible risk that the LoS status has not been conveyed to the DVLA. In the absence of confirmation, the DVLA may be unaware of the stolen status when enquiries are made.
Additionally, at 6-week weeding, the LoS marker falls from the PNC. Any enquiry of the PNC post-weeding will NOT alert to the stolen status of the VRM. Police/PNC enquiries, ANPR, vehicle provenance searches and DVLA requests will all fail to return a LoS marker.
The likelihood of the vehicle being recovered is reduced if not negated.
The extent of Gwent’s conduct in relation to weeding, the number of VRMs affected, cannot be precisely determined from available information (LoS records) and in the absence of other influencing factors. The situation is not assisted by Gwent police:
- Acknowledgement weeding (DAF reports) is not monitored
- Refusing to provide recent information – see ‘core finding’ (unavoidable logic) below.
Analysis of Gwent police LoS data sources has been undertaken
- Home Office LoS records – understood to represent PNC submissions
- Gwent police LoS numbers
- DVLA ‘stolen’ notifications
In the absence of any other explanation, 100’s of Gwent police LoS records are affected by weeding; 100’s of VRMs reported LoS by Gwent police are not recorded as such by the DVLA. This concern arises from the following statistical 2024 information for Gwent police :
- 375 DVLA LoS records
- 1,051 Home Office LoS markers (annual average)
The above representing a difference of 676 records i.e. 676 LoS markers not held by the DVLA – which could result from weeding.
However, in response to an FoIA request Gwent responded that in 2024 the constabulary recorded 1,040 LoS reports i.e. not dissimilar to the Home Office average (above).
- Why is the DVLA only aware of 375 ‘stolen’ (LoS) records for that year?
There is an enormous difference between Gwent’s LoS figures and those the DVLA has received
Complaint:
If, as appears to be a plausible explanation, the discrepancy relates to weeding i.e. Gwent is NOT confirming LoS reports and thereby preventing them from reaching the DVLA, ultimately there are 100’s of stolen Gwent VRMs not recorded as such.
Requested outcome:
Recorded outcome determination & rationale; where applicable, learning/debrief and supervisory action.
C 7. Operational Risk and Public Harm
The removal of stolen markers:
a) legitimises stolen vehicles,
b) interferes with recovery,
c) undermines insurer and public confidence,
d) corrupts national crime data.
Complaint:
This is not administrative error but a governance failure with public risk.
Requested outcome:
Recorded outcome determination & rationale; where applicable, learning/debrief and supervisory action.
C 8. Core Finding (Unavoidable Logic)
If the remedial process had been effective and embedded, the volume of ‘unconfirmed/weeding’ records should be negligible, and the information sought by FoIA would be minimal or non-existent. The continuing presence of relevant records and examples demonstrates the remedial control has not been effective
The fact that information exists to withhold, explain, or redact is itself evidence that the process failed, as such records should not exist if the remedial control were effective
This information having been disclosed before,
- is it now being withheld to hide the extent of the problem; that there is a serious issue which should not exist but which, due to a lack of oversight, is assisting criminality, reducing recoveries?
C 9. Service & Handling Failures
the continuity of evidence is conveyed at:
Attachment 6. events [restricted]
About my raising the 11/2025 incidence of suspected weeding, the head of Phoenix Bureau assured I would be called back that day. I was not.
Required determination:
• Why was the callback assurance not met?
Chased by email, the head of phoenix bureau’s out of office provided an email address for contacting Phoenix Bureau
Required determination:
• Why was the incorrect Phoenix email provided?
Utilising a supplied ‘phoenix’ phone number, the impression given was that this was a personal number, I should not possess it and was to delete it.
The inference was of impropriety on my part.
The number is in fact a work supplied one and the issue has not, to my knowledge, been investigated or presented to the ICO as a breach. The conduct was disproportionate.
Required determination:
• Why the initial email framed the phone as “personal” and invoked GDPR
My treatment appears procedurally irregular the conduct creating a chilling effect on legitimate escalation to be subject to the head of disclosure (data protection) attention, likely associated with the inappropriate vexatious stance and misrepresentation to the ICO.
Required determination:
• Why Phoenix Bureau passed the matter to ‘disclosure’
• Whether ‘disclosure’ was associated with the FoIA – above misrepresentation and if so
• Why ‘disclosure’ did not exclude themselves give the conduct previously engaged – as opposed to seek to address/over see the issues?
‘Phoenix’ had previously managed the weeding enquiry, this is a phoenix procedure.
The recent approach in respect of a specific weeded VRM was handled tardily, Gwent police were slow to confirm weeding
Required determination:
• Why was there no review/investigation despite acknowledged confusion
The weeding PNC removal occurred after 6 weeks of seeming inactivity in respect of the crime by Gwent police. Indeed, currently, despite 3 months having elapsed, apparently enquiries are ongoing, specifically:
• To find the vehicle
• For CCTV
Required determination:
• Why there are ongoing enquiries at this late stage, whether there are such enquiries
That such enquiries are incomplete at this late stage infers tardiness or that no such avenues are being pursued. CCTV should have been secured months ago – to our knowledge, they have been.
Remedies Sought
Formal registration and outcome determination of each complaint head.
- Written explanation addressing each allegation.
- Confirmation of governance ownership of PNC integrity.
- Disclosure of risk assessments and decision records.
- Consideration of referral to OPCC / HMICFRS if systemic failings are confirmed.
Yours faithfully,
P. Swift