Neil Wilby Media

Lancashire Constabulary, a £250,000 operation, and the semantics of secrecy

Earlier this year, Lancashire Constabulary and its political overseer, the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (OPCC), both gave familiar answers to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests: “Neither confirm nor deny.”

Those requests sought details of what has become known as the “£250,000 Task Force” — a discreet operation assembled by the force to handle the relentless stream of complaints surrounding one West Lancashire resident.

The questions were logical and straightforward: What was the operation called, who commanded it, what were its terms of reference, how was the cost treated in annual budgets, and what oversight had the PCC applied?

The OPCC replied with unusual speed, claiming it held no information and directing the applicant back to Lancashire Constabulary. The force, in turn, issued a blanket NCND response.

That double refusal only heightened suspicion that something substantial was being hidden. A £250,000 annual outlay — in the context of a force wrestling with austerity, recruitment freezes and public trust issues — is no small matter.

The Inspector Clough admission

Into this information vacuum, and a stalled journalistic investigation, dropped two surprising documents: A social media post on 24th March 2024 by the subject of the resource-heavy police operation, and an email written by Inspector Daniel Clough, formerly a central part of the same operation, which, it later emerged, was sent on the same day.

This chronology adds further weight. Witness evidence, and a revealing exhibit in High Court proceedings, confirmed that Clough’s email reply was sought directly in response to press reporting: Within half an hour of the email being sent, its language was echoed almost verbatim in the ‘X’ post declaring, in unequivocal terms, that “there is no secret task force.”

The Clough email, however, contained a striking concession. Whilst denying that a “task force” existed, the inspector acknowledged that “substantial resources” were being committed to complaints generated both by and about the same individual.

More troubling still, Inspector Clough prefaced his remarks with the line: “Please use this email as something you can use with any legal advisor.”  For a serving police officer to frame an intervention in this way — effectively advice for use in litigation — raises obvious questions of propriety and partiality.

This email might have remained obscure but for that High Court litigation which concluded earlier this month, where it was exhibited as evidence (a redacted version can be read here) in April 2024. The intention was to show that press reporting about a £250,000 task force was unfounded.

The effect was, in reality, quite the opposite. Once placed before the court, the document entered the public domain as formal evidence — and with it, an acknowledgement from a serving inspector that exceptional resources were indeed being devoted to one single member of the public.

What was meant as a denial of a “task force” became, in practice, corroboration.

An unwarranted, and indeed unethical and unprofessional intervention, had become a public denial, reinforcing the very semantics now at the heart of the debate.

The readers should also bear in mind that the unanswered question is not just about cost or nomenclature, but purpose: whether this quarter-million-pound operation exists to prosecute wrongdoing or to protect it. That is a debate for another day.

When stakeholders call it “Operation Malaya 2”

For those drawn into the orbit of the disputes, the semantics of what Lancashire Constabulary chooses to call its arrangements are beside the point. Stakeholders routinely refer to the current structure as “Operation Malaya 2” – a nod to a short-lived 2017 task force codenamed Operation Malaya.

That earlier operation, which ran for only four months, cost considerably less than the present structure. Yet the OPCC acknowledged its existence in disclosure made during 2019 civil proceedings. The precedent is clear: when a task force was smaller, cheaper, and less enduring, the PCC knew about it.

Which raises the question: why does his office now disclaim all knowledge of a much larger, more costly arrangement led, according to multiple sources, by Superintendent Gary Crowe and the Head of Legal Services, Sharon Cottam?

The semantics problem

The Clough email attempts to draw a distinction: substantial resources are indeed applied, but, internally, the force does not call it a “task force.”

That hair-splitting has consequences. If the force avoids the label, the PCC can plausibly claim “no information held.” If the operation continues under the codename Malaya, then failure to disclose becomes even more problematic, suggesting continuity without accountability.

Either way, those affected persons experience the same reality: investigations, arrests, interviews, reports, files and extensive officer time devoted to one individual’s disputes. The semantics matter little when the structure functions in practice as a task force.

Oversight void

The money spent on this ‘task force’ or ‘operation’, whichever version one prefers, is not abstract. It is public funds.

Whilst Lancashire Constabulary has remained silent on the precise figure, the £250,000 estimate is grounded in available data: the cost of two inspectors, supporting response and investigating officers, control room and backroom staff, and the involvement of senior command, professional standards and legal services.

Crime logs reluctantly disclosed in ongoing civil litigation (Wilkes & Vella v Chief Constable of Lancashire), show more than 5,000 pages of material connected to the disputes. That scale alone suggests significant resource implications.

Yet the OPCC, under Commissioner Clive Grunshaw, insists it holds no relevant information. That stance, repeated even in the face of an internal review request, sits uneasily with the PCC’s statutory duty to hold the Chief Constable to account for budgetary control and efficient policing.

If Mr Grunshaw’s office truly has no knowledge of a £250,000 line of spending, the implications are serious. If, on the other hand, it does have knowledge but prefers to keep it from the public record, the potential consequences are equally grave.

Wider context: Legal Services under scrutiny

A troubling pattern emerges: Large-scale disclosure failures in Wilkes/Vella, unanswered LBCs, and now the semantics over the so-called task force.

In May and June this year, the Department failed to respond to two Letters Before Claim served on the Chief Constable. One concerned a data breach, another sought judicial review of complaint-handling decisions. In the civil courts, ignoring pre-action correspondence is more than discourteous – it is an affront to process and, ultimately, to open justice.

Add to that the department’s controversial handling of disclosure in the long-running Wilkes/Vella County Court claim, where a circuit judge criticised serious procedural failures, the picture is one of systemic failings.

The unanswered questions

Against that backdrop, the Clough email acquires sharper significance. Here was a middle-ranking officer, acknowledging extraordinary resources being deployed. over complaints either made by or about just one person. Here, too, was the force itself, deploying FOIA NCND responses to deny transparency.

The unanswered questions remain stark:

• Why is Lancashire Constabulary unwilling to acknowledge the operation publicly?
• Why does the PCC disclaim all knowledge, despite precedent from Operation Malaya?
• How much public money has been spent in total over the years?
• And why is such expenditure tolerated without clear accountability?

Conclusion

When is a task force not a task force? According to Inspector Clough, it is when the force declines to call it one – even if the reality is that unusual resources are funnelled into the same orbit, year after year, at enormous cost.

For stakeholders caught up in the disputes, the label is immaterial. They live with the consequences of a system that appears more invested in managing one individual’s complaints and legal threats than in delivering effective justice.

For taxpayers, and the wider public, the issue is simpler still: Quarter of a million pounds a year is being spent, but neither the police force nor its elected overseer is willing to account for it.

Lancashire Constabulary may choose to deny that a task force exists. But the Clough email, released into daylight through civil litigation, tells another story – one that now demands answers.

A Three-part Series

This article opens a three-part series: The next instalment will consider the potential regulatory consequences of Inspector Clough’s email, the effects on those tasked to work alongside him and the reputational risks for his police force employer. A third article will widen the lens to examine Lancashire Constabulary’s Legal Services and PSD, and the deeper questions of transparency, accountability and stewardship of public money.

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Neil Wilby is a journalist, court reporter and transparency campaigner who has reported on police misconduct, regulatory failures, and criminal and civil justice since 2009. He is the founder and editor of Neil Wilby Media, launched in 2015.

Page last updated: Sunday 24th August 2025 at 11h05

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Image Credits: Lancs Constabulary

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