Police hail big fall in family violence calls over holidays

A plan to tackle family violence in South Taranaki appears to be bearing fruit, with the number of incidents recorded over the festive season down by a third compared to last year.

Traditionally Christmas is a time when violence in the home can flare up and Sergeant Dan White, head of youth services and family violence in South Taranaki, said officers did ‘‘a bit of lead up work’’ before December 25 in an effort to minimise the risk.

This included extra home visits and initiatives like Operation Blue Santa, a collaboration between the New Plymouth Police Family Harm team and Roderique Hope Emergency Trust, which provided 100 baskets of food .

For the period of December 22 to January 8, White said South Taranaki police attended 61 family harm incidents, which was about four each day.

‘‘At the same time last year we had 96,’’ he said. White credited the efforts of police, iwi and nongovernment agencies.

The collaborative approach included addressing issues like drug and alcohol use or financial stress. A dedicated family violence officer, who is a serving police constable, was also in place, White said.

New Plymouth based Sergeant Bruce Irvine said between December 15 and January 4, police responded to 150 calls involving family harm.

On average, this was about seven incidents each day.

Irvine said the circumstances of the cases ranged from verbal arguments to breaches of protection orders and physical assaults. Not all of the call-outs resulted in arrests being made, he said.

On December 25, officers attended seven domestic violence incidents but the busiest day was in the lead up to Christmas, on December 23, where 13 calls were logged.