Crime in Sutton

I was at Police Consultative Committee AGM last night and was very proud to be elected unopposed to its Executive, so at least I have won one election this year!!:-)

Key points from the meeting:

1. We were audited by the Metropolitan Police Authority who have higher expectations of their groups in return for funding and clearly we will need in future to demonstrate our levels of community engagement through a clear constitutional connect with the Safer Neighbourhood Teams. In return I suspect we should be aiming to have non-voting representation on any future local Community Safety Scrutiny Committee, in a similar way to the Pateients Forums having speaking rights at Council Health Scrutiny Committees.

2. The Sutton Guardian published crime figures yesterday, that seemed to have confused perscentages for crime levels in wards. I asked about this and the Police said that Annual Crime rates in the borough as a whole had dropped as well as in 13 out of 18 wards, including, I am pleased to say, a 14% reduction in St Helier ward. I have no doubt this reduction is due to the deployment of local Policing teams. I understand a clarification of the figures will appear in next weeks Sutton Guardian.

3. The Police circulated a list of the priorities of all 18 Safer Neighbourhood Panels. This is really helpful in getting an overview on what is happening across the borough in terms of anti-social behaviour. I assume this will also go to Council Area Committees.