County lines is key concern

Maidenhead: Highlighting police and crime issues

The Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) for Thames Valley walked councillors through the crime and policing issues in the borough in a meeting last Thursday.

Taking at the Communities Overview and Scrutiny Panel, PCC Matthew Barber said that although the force has more officers than ever before, there needs to be more recruitment to match the population increase.

The force currently has more than 4,500 members, with 269 new ones recruited as of June.

A current major concern of Thames Valley Police (TVP) is county lines drug dealing and the impact on children.

“A real concern is around the level of exploitation and the harm caused particularly to young children, both boys and girls,” said Mr Barber.

“Relatively low-level crimes can actually be linked to a wider network. One example is bicycle thefts. That might be young children stealing bikes for £20-30 worth of drugs.

“The gang then sells these on the internet and makes vast profits.”

Cllr Andrew Johnson,

leader of the council, stressed the importance of a ‘zero tolerance’ approach on so-called minor crimes, such as antisocial behaviour.

Mr Barber agreed it was important to take notice of these, as these are some of the major concerns in the borough.

“We can’t be blind or complacent about the concerns that residents have,” he said.

One such issue is flytipping. A pilot has been launched in Oxford that Mr Barber hopes will be effective and can be rolled out in other local authorities, perhaps including the Royal Borough.

The pilot involves financing the council to launch its own investigations into these offences.

Fly-tipping is something local authorities deal with, rather than police – but additional funding from elsewhere will help increase the amount of investigation a council can do.

This initial investment would be supplemented by fines successfully collected from the culprits – going back into the pot to fund future investigations.

Mr Barber also talked about community speedwatches, whereby volunteer groups track the speed of cars using a speed gun.

These volunteers then report drivers exceeding the speed limit to the police, with the aim of educating drivers to slow down.

Mr Barber said that by the end of the year, the aim is to have all the community speedwatch groups back up and running.

The police have a budget for equipment to facilitate this.

Cllr Jon Davey (WWRA, Clewer & Dedworth West) wanted to know if the police would effectively be taking control of the speedwatches moving forward.

Mr Barber said that oversight of speedwatches by police has so far been ‘patchy’ and ad hoc, with different levels of support or training in different areas.

He said the aim was to integrate it better and that, moving forward, Thames Valley Police would be taking more responsibility for speedwatches.