Neighbourhood Policing Team Shine in Bettws

As a result of the combined efforts, the community has seen a 17% reduction in crime over the past year, in particular anti-social behaviour.

Some people may think that the rapid decrease in anti-social behaviour referrals are a result of hard line policing and zero tolerance. This is not the case however, as the new way of community inclusion found through Neighbourhood Policing has been used on this occasion, proving that partners can work successfully together to achieve their aims without taking a hard line approach which in many cases acts as a catalyst for future problems.

Sergeant Chris Truscott stated that “Heavy handed policing does not always work. Every community is different, and therefore needs to be policed according to its individual needs. Bettws is a fine example of how this type of community strategy has worked, as the Neighbourhood Policing Team have taken into account every aspect of the community and its problems, looking forward and working forward with the people that matter, for issues that matter to them”.

Neighbourhood Policing is provided by teams of police officers and Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs), and as seen in Bettws also together with local authority wardens, volunteers and partners, including Bridgend County Borough Council, Valleys to Coast Housing association, Bettws Primary School, Boys and Girls Club, Tenants and Residents Association and Neighbourhood Watch.

It aims to provide people who live or work in a neighbourhood with access to local policing services through a named point of contact, influence over policing priorities in their neighbourhood, interventions through joint action with partners and the public and answers such as sustainable solutions and feedback on what is being done.

Neighbourhood Policing Teams find out what the local issues are that make people feel unsafe in their neighbourhood and ask them to put them in order of priority through the PACT meetings. Neighbourhood Policing Team’s decide with partners and local people what should be done to deal with those priorities and work with them to deliver the solutions.

The priorities in Bettws were obvious. Bettws stood as the ward with the highest levels of anti social behaviour out of 39 wards in the Borough.

Through clever and innovative decision making between the partners, simple ideas were brought forward and initiated in the community to attempt to deal with the rising level of anti-social behaviour.

One of the simple ideas was a new community engagement project, known as ‘Timebanking’. The project has been led by Joe Dunster, a coordinator at Bettws Boys and Girls club which has also seen an

increase in funding and help over the years as seen in a recent ITV ‘Wales this Week’ documentary.

The concept of Timebanking is relatively straightforward. Members of the community volunteer their time to do specific tasks within their community. For every hour of their time spent volunteering they earn a ‘time credit’ that can be spent at participating venues to pay for attendance at events and goods and services.

Originally developed as part of the Millennium Volunteers Programme in 1997, (MV), MV aimed to encourage a diverse range of young people to make a sustained commitment of voluntary activity for the benefit of the community. The ten principle aims of the programmes are: personal commitment; community benefit; voluntary commitment; inclusiveness; ownership by young people; variety of opportunities; partnership; quality of opportunities; recognition and progression.

Creation Development trust, who run the MV programme for the area are a local charitable company was set up by local people to address social, environmental and economic needs within the communities of the Garw valley, communities that are amongst the most deprived in the Bridgend County Borough. Their aim is to work flexibly and be

accessible, and play an important role in supporting and assisting local communities in their revitalisation to become prosperous, healthy and sustainable places to live, work and visit.

Over the last three years, Creation Development ran a pilot Timebanking scheme at Blaengarw. This was extremely successful and as a result of its success was deemed appropriate for it to be piloted in Bettws. Results arising from the scheme in Blaengarw have been reflected in Bettws, such as increased community reassurance, lower crime, community empowerment, community trust, improved social networks and increased community intelligence. Sergeant Angela Bennett, Community Safety has been involved with the scheme since the beginning, acting as a solid link between the Neighbourhood Policing Team and the Community.

The scheme in Bettws has been running since June 2007, and is slowly working its way into every aspect of the community. The Boys and Girls club stands at the heart of the project, its impressive centre with IT suite, boxing room, all purpose space, snooker room, outdoor area and kitchen holds a certain appeal to the young people in the area.

The centre acts as a base for the scheme to run from: here the children can earn and spend their credits.

Courses such as first aid, beauty and kick boxing are run in the club, and trips are provided. Nearly every child from the club attended a trip to Oakwood theme park in West Wales. They were given the option of paying a cash amount or earning the trip by volunteering through the Timebanking scheme. The majority of the children volunteered hours of their time to attend, doing activities such as litter picking, running the tuck shop, helping to plan and run events such as Halloween parties, and helping out in the local library and hairdressers. It is easy to see that when the children of the community are engaged in a worthwhile scheme that they can gain something from, the levels of anti-social behaviour in the community drop rapidly.

Police Community Support officers have had a major role to play in the effort to tackle anti-social behaviour in the village. Establishing good links with the community initially was key, leading them on to becoming ‘part of the furniture’ in the Boys and Girls club. High visibility foot patrols enabled them to get to know the faces in the community. As a result of this they have been able to stop and talk to residents of all ages and situations to gain a deeper understanding of what needed to be solved, and how it was to be done.

The work that the PCSOs carry out is not only invaluable to the residents of the community, but is also invaluable to the front line officers. If issues can be dealt with by PCSOs who are on high visibility foot patrols before behaviour escalates, then this will result in a dramatic reduction in calls leaving the front line officers to attend calls of a more serious nature that require their prompt attention. It is obvious that the community reassurance work that is carried out by the Police Community Support Officers benefits all parties, and as seen in Bettws can really make a difference to a community.

The PCSOs have been given a base in the local Primary school, where the local PACT meeting is also held. The junior school children are often involved with the PCSOs and usually see them around, creating valuable links which may act as a preventative measure for committing crime for these children in the future. They have been and will continue to be a valuable community resource, and they will be involved in many community events in the near future.

Bettws also plays host to a Youth Pact meeting where young people have a chance to express their priorities for the area and talk to their local officers about topics that matter to them. The meetings also act as a good basis for suggestion sharing, and also provide the young people with information from a policing perspective surrounding anything that may be happening in there area.

The Neighbourhood Policing Team regularly carries out routine reassurance checks to the vulnerable members of the community, such as the elderly, physically impaired or those people from minority communities. By carrying out these visits, there is no need for any such members of the community to feel isolated or anxious. The NPT’s community mobile numbers have been published so if a member of the community feels it necessary to contact an officer or Community Support Officer who he or she feels that they can trust, the option is available.

Multi agency site inspections have been provided by BCBC and V2C, generally improving the environment of Bettws through ongoing regeneration. Windows are being replaced and graffiti removed which will hopefully encourage the residents of the community to be vigilant in the fight against vandals. These concerns are also discussed and new ideas are brought forward from the regular Tenants and Residents association meetings.

Overall the cohesiveness of the community has played a major part in the success of Neighbourhood Policing in Bettws. The drop in anti-social behaviour speaks for itself, proving that Neighbourhood Policing can work. This level of success will hopefully be reflected in other wards in the Borough in due course making Bridgend a safer place to live and work in.