Inspector Donna Lawton, Nottinghamshire Police
Minutes:
The Police representative had not arrived at the start of this agenda item, Councillor Jon Collins spoke of his concerns around policing issues in the city, highlighting the following points:
(a) there are increasing concerns with how policing is being run across the city, and it may be useful to invite someone more senior from the Police to a future meeting of the Area Committee to get an understanding of why the Police think that crime is increasing again;
(b) increasingly, the priorities of the Police, such as cybercrime and historic sex abuse, though important issues, do not align with the everyday crime priorities of Nottingham citizens such as burglaries and drug use;
(c) since the Police have moved away from having a city division, it seems like the priorities are no longer tailored to the needs of a city. Crime has gone up in terms of number of offences, from approximately 25,000 to around 33,0000 since the city division was lost. There is a sense that we may be going back to the way they used to police and the impact that had in the early 2000s, where there were around 75,000 crimes per year in the city;
(d) there is a particular concern around reports of people not getting a response from 999, when a crime in progress is not considered high priority enough. 101 does not seem adequate at times.
The Committee noted the lack of an agenda item on Community Protection, which would cover some more low level offences that citizens may be concerned with, and Councillor Collins expanded on the issues facing crime prevention in the city:
(e) the Community Protection Officers are increasingly being pulled into the city centre to deal with the low level issues and crimes that the police don’t deal with anymore. That’s requiring more presence there in the evening from Community Protection Officers, which unfortunately means a reduced availability to attend evening meetings. This is a shame because the Area Committees not only allowed Community Protection to feedback on progress to citizens, but also allowed citizens to feedback on issues to Community Protection.
Richard Hunter, Neighbourhood Policing Sergeant deputising for Inspector Donna Lawson, then arrived at the meeting and provided his update to the Committee:
(f) the recent disorder in Sneinton was spread over 2 nights. The first night involved a large fight. So far 2 arrests have been made and enquiries are ongoing. On the second night there was some damage to top market by males in balaclavas with baseball bats. Despite ongoing investigation, no motive has become apparent. There have been extensive reassurance patrols since the incidents, and no reported issues have arisen since then. It is believed that the incident has been contained;
(g) an annual violence reduction operation will be taking place soon, if anyone would like to attend as an observer, they should contact Richard Hunter and he can facilitate this. There may also be a documentary team in attendance;
(h) basic crime prevention advice has been distributed, 2 recent burglaries have taken place where doors or windows were unsecured. Reminders to secure all entrance points have been distributed by Facebook and Twitter.
RESOLVED:
(1) to thank Sergeant Richard Hunter for his update and note the contents;
(2) to invite a senior colleague from Nottinghamshire Police to attend the next meeting of Area Committee East.