Last night at the Safer Reading campaign meeting I mentioned yesterday, we received an update about Neighbourhood Policing.
On the positive side, Thames Valley Police have finally seemed to have recognised the need to support chairs of Neighbourhood Action Groups (NAGs) - all of whom are volunteers from the local community. This is something I've raised several times as I'm aware that some people have resigned as chairs finding it an uphill struggle. In addition, two admin assistants have been appointed to support Neighbourhood Police teams.
Following the concerns I expressed when Neighbourhood Policing was launched in 2007 about problems around the retention of neighbourhood officers in Reading I was pleased to hear officers state that it was the policy of TVP to do their best to keep officers in their neighbourhoods for a minimum of two years.
I spoke out at the meeting about what I see as ongoing threats to the overall success of Neighbourhood Policing in Reading:
1. The fact that Neighbourhood Action Groups have no budget for publicity - so therefore they cannot tell the local community simple things like when meetings are taking place, what work they are doing (like their regular environmental visual audits) and most importantly how local people can get involved. I've highlighted this problem before and in my view this issue is seriously undermining progress of Neighbourhood Policing in North Whitley and Newtown Neighbourhoods where local participation is currently at a very low level.
TVP Officers at the meeting told us that other forces had given NAGs discretionary budgets to help them get off the ground and to publicise their work. Why isn't Thames Valley Police doing this, particularly at a time when finding alternative funding from local businesses will become even more difficult?
The Labour politicians who are members of the Crime & Disorder Reduction Partnership and who were present at the meeting last night failed to come up with answers to the questions I posed.
2. The fact that local priorities, adopted by NAGs - as determined by local residents as part of the consultation that was held before Neighbourhood Policing was launched in 2007 - are not always the key priorities of Thames Valley Police (these are not determined at a local level and are more to do with meeting national targets set in Whitehall).
In many Police neighbourhoods in Reading, local people have identified anti-social behaviour as a key concern, but the current stated priority for TVP is burglary (understanably when you look at crime figures across the town).
I was reassured by TVP officers that it was possible to satisfy both sets of of priorities - sadly, I don't think this is reflected by the current level of resources dedicated to perceived 'low' priority police issues such as street-drinking in East Reading and anti-social behaviour in North Whitley.
I led the Lib Dem campaign last year for a more community-focussed, effective approach to tackling anti-social behaviour in Reading which included plans to support Neighbourhood Action Groups more fully, alongside plans to make it easier to report crime.
Thus far, neither Labour or the Conservatives have put forward any suggestions about ways to make Neighbourhood Policing sustainable, or ways to improve community engagement and sadly last night's meeting was no different.
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