Nuisance complaints top 200,000 in West
Police in the West field 23 complaints of nuisance behaviour every hour, official figures have revealed.
The Home Secretary Alan Johnson also said victims of anti-social behaviour have to wait up to two years before the louts harassing them are dealt with, and pledged to speed up the process.
Parliamentary figures show there were more than 200,000 incidents of rowdy or nuisance behaviour recorded by West police forces in 2007-08, including almost 64,000 in Avon and Somerset, the force which covers Bristol.
There were almost 30,000 cases in Dorset, 23,000 in Wiltshire, more than 20,000 in Gloucestershire and more than 70,000 in Devon and Cornwall.
The figures also highlight other public order offences, showing a total of 2,527 complaints of street drinking across the West, 568 of substance abuse and 3,018 of begging or vagrancy, with rural Dorset recording 1,351, the most in the region.
There were 8,239 "hate incidents", including 6,788 in Wiltshire, the highest number in the country, exceeding even the Metropolitan Police. There was no data for Avon and Somerset in the category.
Wiltshire Police said it was believed that the figure on hate crimes was a typographical error, and there had been 317 incidents between July 2008 and June 2009, which put the constabulary into the lowest section of forces.
There were just over 7,000 reports of animal problems in the South West and 12,524 hoax 999 calls.
The information is from the National Incident Category List, on which police record every incident, whether from victims, witnesses or third parties, and whether crime related or not.
Most reports are received via telephone calls from the public or visits to police front offices.
Since the figures cover reported incidents, and not offences, only a proportion would have resulted in further action, such as prosecutions or cautions.
They came after Mr Johnson admitted ministers had taken their eye off the ball when it came to sorting out anti-social behaviour.
He promised new measures, including fast-tracking yobs through courts, moves to cut the time it takes to dish out ASBOs and more support for victims of anti-social behaviour.
He said: "We've followed intensive activity with a certain degree of complacency on the issue."
Mr Johnson admitted people who report yobbish behaviour can find themselves passed between police and councils in a "never ending circle of phone calls" until they feel like a nuisance.
"In a sense, I'm saying we dragged our feet by not making it (anti-social behaviour) a priority," he confessed.
"No one should assume that these are problems they are expected to live with – and no one who reports anti-social behaviour should be made to feel as if they are the ones causing the nuisance, not the perpetrator."
Mr Johnson signalled a shift from his predecessor Jacqui Smith when he said it was not enough to tell victims of crime they were a statistical anomaly.
Politicians should not be "defensive" with victims. Their experience was "every bit as valid" as the statistics.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling said Britain had the highest violent crime rate in Europe, and Mr Johnson's comments "show just how complacent and out of touch this Government really is".
4 Comments
by A victim of police abuse, Cornwall
Tuesday, July 07 2009, 10:01AM
“Yes, but what do you do when it is the police who are the abusive, violating & traumatising problem...and nobody cares & the IPCC is useless.
Unlike most people I will not forget the Charles De Menezes killing, or Ian Tomlinson death, or the four Nottingham police who repeatedly tazered & punched a vctim (on youtube), or the Enfield police use of water torture?, or the killing of two police dogs, or my own personal experience of multiple homophobic police abuses & violations.
We need to clean up the police force & remove the HIGH level of scum working within the police ...still protected by equally corrupt senior officers.”
by Mike, Staple Hill, Bristol
Monday, July 06 2009, 3:52PM
“Wait a minute Paul. I think he may be on to somthing.... All of those drunken calls to ex-girlfriends...potential girlfriends...your mates girlfriends..etc could all have been easily avoided with Johns bit of technology!! Get it made!!”
by Paul, Bristol
Monday, July 06 2009, 2:15PM
“Are you serious John...Produce a phone that detects alcohol on the users breath and stops the phone from calling out.
So, i have just come out of the pub after having a few drinks and begin my walk home when I see a crime being commited. I try to call the police but unfortunately as I have been drinking i am not allowed to make phone calls, so carry on my way home leaving the crime to be committed.
The rest of your comment actually made good sense but I'm not sure you thought that bit through.”
by John, Bristol
Monday, July 06 2009, 8:43AM
“It is all very well targets being set out by the Government if there are too few Police Officers to deal with them.
To suggest, in the Policing Pledge, that Officers will attend within a set time gives members of the public false aspirations of service. It has, in effect, hamstrung the Police in how they deal with incidents of a lower priority.
Couple this to a widespread misuse of the 999 service and you have a recipe for disaster.
This widespread misuse is often justified by the caller saying that they have no credit on their mobile phone and the Police authority insisting that ALL 999 calls, whether justified or not, are dealt with at first contact.
This misuse, compounded by the fact that members of the public seem to think that Police are deaf and clairvoyant when talking over the phone does not make dealing with incidents any easier.
Perhaps some clever telephone manufacturer could produce a phone that detects alcohol on the users breath and stops the phone from calling out. After all, some cars have that technology.
Anti Social Behaviour does not only cover nuisance youths, it also covers the disruption caused by noisy house parties but the Government, in their infinite wisdom, decided that this should be dealt with at local council level who simply do not have the manpower to deal effectively.
Local Environmental Health departments are stretched even farther than the Police so, if yours, or my, neighbours decide to party through the night we have to put up with it.
Government is fond of setting targets and making promises that others have to try an work to but they do not grasp the reality of this society where consideration, good manners and respect for ones fellow man have all but gone by the board.”