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We need police action, not pathetic excuses
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AS Chair of Haverstock Safer Neighbourhoods Citizens Panel (Hav SNCP) for less than a year, I am most concerned at the negative views of the Safer Neighbourhoods police teams in Haverstock and Gospel Oak (GO) wards expressed in Camden New Journal editorial coverage and correspondence.
I have tried to show some of the positive sides of what has been achieved in the past, but to no avail, with the paper not wishing to print my comments.
The main issues seem to turn on anti-social behaviour by young people in the Queen’s Crescent and Malden Road areas.
The views expressed seem to focus on regrets at the change from the former sector policing approach and on political attacks on the current Council Administration.
While I have been politically active in other roles outside my involvement as Chair of Hav SNCP, I have endeavoured to keep the panel apolitical, as it should be.
I’d like to set the record straight about the Safer Neighbourhoods Teams (SNT) initiative here in Haverstock. The facts are these:
The main focal point of the area, Queen’s Crescent, is shared by the GO team and ourselves. It is the dividing line for the two teams and hopefully will soon house the Safer Neighbourhoods office for both SNTs.
Haverstock SNT has issued section 59 warnings and taken mopeds from unruly users. Some of these have been taken to court for driving offences.
Hav SNT have just applied for our 12th and 13th Asbos. Some of the recipients of our Asbos have received jail time and have been removed from society, albeit for a short time.
Hav SNT have closed crack houses and raided numerous suspected drug dens, with panel members being present to witness the acts.
We have worked with the council to secure accommodation for those vulnerable tenants who have been bullied into opening their houses to drug users.
The SNT officers have been an integral part of every youth event in the last three years, from football matches in premiership football stadiums to cross-ward go-karting events in Hertfordshire.
Hav SNT are heavily involved with the Rhyl primary school and regularly visit the school yard. This has seen increased access to the familiar and visible officers of the SNT.
Hav SNT were the first team in London to work so closely with partners that we were able to enforce an Anti Social Behaviour Injunction in Durston whereby the miscreant not only was arrested by us, but was taken by us to Wormwood scrubs, brought back to County Court and given a full sentence.
We have an officer assigned to ensure that our Haverstock Neighbourhood Watches grow and an officer assigned to visit faith premises and a liaison officer for Haverstock schools.
One of these officers recently dealt with a stab victim and was commended for his actions.
Hav SNT are also party to a number of ongoing operations with specialist units and have secured the assistance of other units to tackle issues within the ward.
I would also like to point out that Our Safer Neighbourhoods Citizens Panel is the only one out of the 18 in Camden to run its meetings a unique format.
We hold the first hour “in camera” and open the second section of the meeting to the public – limited to stakeholders that either reside or work within the Haverstock borders unless specifically requested to talk on an area of expertise at the invitation of the panel or Met Police.
This gives residents a chance to view for themselves how the Panel pick our priorities for the coming months.
It is a shame more people have not taken up this opportunity in the past to attend.
SIMON HORVAT - MARCOVIC
Chair
Haverstock SNCP • YET another incident took place in and around Malden Road in the middle of the night last week involving rowdy youths in a gang fight. Emergency services were called around 3.30am and the offenders mysteriously vanished when the police cars arrived.
My son-in-law and daughter live in the eye of the storm at St Silas Place. Neither of them know how to get the police to resolve the on-going problem of uncontrolled youths.
The Haverstock Safer Neighbourhoods team never took a serious, long-term view of this unacceptable situation. Shopkeepers aren’t safe, and some give up and move away – much to the detriment of local residents. Others apparently employ bodyguards to protect themselves.
All we hear from the polices are excuses. What we want is action rather than moaning about paperwork. Police officers have always had to do paperwork to prepare for court. What is so different now?
S ROBINSON
Gilden Crescent, NW5
• WHAT a brilliant idea from D V Felix (Policing around here is total cop out, May 31) suggesting that residents of Haverstock should be given the funds allocated to the ward for policing so they could handle their own security.
The Malden Road and Queen’s Crescent problems aren’t caused by Yardies or such hardcore criminals, but mostly by kids and petty crooks.
Having got away with bad behaviour for years, they now believe it is their human right to run the show. They have not been taught any different by their parents or the police or the rest of society.
Over the past three years, with all the Safer Neighbourhood resources thrown at this ward, things have gotten worse. Once the kids played ‘chicken’ games on Prince of Wales Road near the Deaton Estate and threw stones at passing cars and bicycles. Now they attack people on the street, steal from them and beat them up. Where will it end? Do we need a serious incident in this area before the police finally take charge?
DUNCAN McMILAN
Prince of Wales Road, NW5
• THE horrific situation in Haverstock Ward described by Labour councillor Syed Hoque is so disturbing that one wonders whether this is the same London Borough of Camden that we in the village of Hampstead share with these poor fellow residents (Nuisance youths an old problem for us, May 31).
Why has it taken Cllr Hoque so long to come forward to question the police over their evident negligence? Does it take a by-election before anyone in authority in that ward will do something to address the misery of so many victims?
Things have apparently gone on for so long in Haverstock without any remedy from local police that it might now take some other agency to come and sort out these destructive youths. The sooner the better for the sake of the reputation of the borough. Reports like this damage London’s reputation as it prepares for the 2012 Olympics.
JJ THIBEAULT
Perrins Lane, NW3
• LABOUR candidate for the Haverstock Ward by-election Mike Katz described accurately the suffering of local residents in Malden Road, Denton Estate and St Silas Place (Marauding gangs rule in lawless Haverstock, May 24).
What surprises me most is how two other candidates have remained quiet about the incompetence of local police to deal with this long-standing problem.
Matt Sanders, who I read lives in St Leonards Square, could probably see from his own home the kids causing mayhem in the shops nearby on Malden Road.
Conservative candidate Peter Horne actually resides in St Silas Place at the heart of all the disruption.
Yet neither seem to have been active in prompting police action. Are both of these candidates totally unaware of the situation? Do they not care at all about the safety of their immediate neighbours and surroundings? Or are they too intimidated to raise their heads above the parapet? Either way, their lack of response does not inspire confidence in their ability to tackle this paramount local problem.
W SPENCER
Castle Road, NW1
• COUNCILLOR Dudley Miles – writing from leafy Belsize Park Gardens – did not reflect the views of local people around Haverstock (Nuisance youths an old problem for us, May 31).
Try as he might to defend his friends in the Town Hall, the PCSOs he mentions have not actually started patrolling yet.
The local Safer Neighbourhoods Team is proving difficult to contact.
Instead of blaming everyone else, shouldn’t the Lib Dem powers-that-be just try to sort the situation out for local people?
ANNA NYBERG
Hawley Road, NW1
• THOSE of us who live at the corner of Prince of Wales Road and Malden Road and have to face daily crimes and anti-social behaviour know that this is not a new problem. When Labour’s
35-year-run at the town hall came to an end, they bequeathed a demoralised neighbourhood to their successors.
The new Lib Dem- led administration have made a good start by recognising that these old policies have failed residents and now need to redouble their efforts to turn things around.
However, we also need to accept that this is not a problem that the council can tackle alone. A greater police presence would make a real difference. As it is, our local police are struggling under a bureaucratic overload and chronic underinvestment, as Home Office spending priorities seem to be focused elsewhere (such as the costly ID cards scheme).
I have put myself forward for the Haverstock by-election because I believe that local residents should have a voice on the council. I care about putting things right because I want my family and friends to be able to walk home at night safely and free from fear.
This corner of Camden is a fantastic place to live, with a real sense of community. Those of us who care about our community must not and will not let the gangs ruin it for us.
MATHEW SANDERS
St Leonards Square, NW5
• LIB Dem Dudley Miles talks about increasing youth funding by a paltry £10,000 in the context of other youth cuts.
I’ve worked in this field for over 10 years and let me remind him that the sum only buys you a nominal number of youth workers hours and this doesn’t include any youth project costs. Is their proposed increase based upon an assessment of the needs of the area? I don’t think so.
The Lib Dems are now in power and people expect them to act, not bury their heads in the sand.
I am sure our residents deserve better from this administration, which has failed so far to protect those who live in fear and uncertainty.
Cllr Abdul Hai (Lab)
Community Safety Lead
q While walking along Holmes Road in Kentish Town, very close to the police station, several youths drew up on motorcycles and dismounted. They went over to a parked motorbike and took it apart with tools which they had brought with them. It was an extraordinary thing to behold as they were quite obviously and brazenly – it was mid-afternoon – stealing motorbike parts.
I stopped a passing member of the police services and gave her the registration numbers of the youths’ vehicles and my telephone number.
Nothing has happened. No one has called from Kentish Town Police Station. There appears to be no interest in stopping this sort of grotesque and arrogant display of criminal depredation.
Since this incident, I have been subjected to yet more Kentish Town delinquency.
Four boys leaped over the wall which separates a local estate from our mews and started jumping on residents’ car roofs. One of the residents came out to protest. They stopped, laughed and then carried on.
Then the boys broke into a gated driveway where there was amotorbike. I started shouting at them at this point, along with another resident. The boys started to throw stones and half-bricks in response and then dismantled the lock on the gate to the driveway, rendering it useless.
I dialled 999, spoke to someone and explained the situation and waited for a police officer to attend. No one came and the boys carried on.
Is there a plan to encourage young people in semi-criminal and criminal patterns of behaviour in Kentish Town?
There does not seem to be the slightest reason to feel afraid of the law in Kentish Town if you are a street criminal. I feel let down by the police.
Name and address supplied
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