FOI 529/25
REQUEST
- The total number of stalking and harassment offences cases your police force has dealt with per financial year, for the past five years. Please display the total case numbers for stalking and harassment separately.
- The total number of stalking and harassment cases in which a physical tracking device was used. This can include an AirTag, SmartTag, Tile, GPS tracker, car tracker. Please display the total case numbers for stalking and harassment separately, and provide this information per financial year, for the past five years.
- The total number of stalking and harassment offences in which a digital tracking device was used. This can include a social media tracker, Life360, phone App tracker. Please display the total case numbers for stalking and harassment separately, and provide this information per financial year, for the past five years.
- The total number of controlling / coercive behaviour cases your police for has dealt with per financial year, for the past five years.
- The total number of controlling / coercive behaviour cases in which a physical tracking device was used. This can include an AirTag, SmartTag, Tile, GPS tracker, car tracker. Please provide this information per financial year, for the past five years.
- The total number of controlling / coercive behaviour cases in which a digital tracking device was used. This can include a social media tracker, Life360, phone App tracker.
Please provide this information per financial year, for the past five years.
- Please can you tell me the total number of Stalking Protection Orders that have been applied for by your police force?
Please give this data per financial year, for the past 5 years.
RESPONSE
Questions 2, 3, 5 & 6
Your request for information has now been considered and I am not obliged to supply the information you have requested.
Section 17(5) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires South Wales Police, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which:
(a) states that fact,
(b) specifies the exemption in question and
(c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.
In relation to your particular request, the following exemption applies:
Section 12 – Exemption where cost of compliance exceeds appropriate limit.
A search has been conducted using the below offences that are categorised under ‘Stalking and Harassment’ between 1st April 2020 and 31st March 2025.
Offences:
- Stalking (8Q)
- Harassment (8L)
- Malicious communications (8R)
- Racially or religiously aggravated harassment (8M)
- Controlling and coercive behaviour (8U)
This search retrieved 77,674 results.
We estimate that it would take approximately 5 – 10 minutes to individually interrogate each occurrence on our crime and incident recording system (Niche RMS) in order to establish if a physical or digital tracking device was used.
We therefore estimate that it would take in excess of 6,472 hours to answer questions 2, 3, 5 and 6 of your request.
It is estimated that the cost of providing you with the information is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond i.e. the cost of locating and retrieving the information exceeds the "appropriate level" as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
In the case of the police service, the appropriate limit is £450 which has been calculated to equate to a total of 18 hours of work.
If any part of the request exceeds the fees limit then Section 12 applies to the whole request.
In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a refusal notice.
Excess cost removes the forces obligation under the Freedom of Information Act, however under Section 16 – Duty to provide advice and assistance, an authority is required to offer an applicant the opportunity to redefine their request within the cost limit. If you were to resubmit your request asking for questions 1, 4 and 7 only, then we may be able to assist.