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Well done to police for community approach
• THE national and local media are full of sensational news about the behaviour of young people.
On Saturday the Queen’s Crescent Community Centre organised a festival specifically focused on the achievement of young people.
They took part in organising the day, ensuring that things ran smoothly, and also performed on the stage.
This was on a day when there had been reports of two acts of extreme violence not far away from Queen’s Crescent.
The festival attracted large numbers of local young people who obviously enjoyed the day. Those who performed on stage did so to a high standard much to the delighted enthusiasm of the young audience.
Much media reporting about young people is extremely negative but, as the festival showed, if the community is prepared to engage positively much can be done to prevent disorder.
Yes there was a police presence at the festival but this was both sensitive and accepted by all.
Indeed we believe the very positive contribution of the police to youth activities at the Queen’s Crescent and Fleet centres has done much to help us with our programme of youth work aimed at preventing youth crime and disorder. The local police are working actively with our young people and this not only helps to change the perceptions of young people but contributes to our prevention strategy. The punitive approach to young people may have its place but it is far better to prevent violence and weapon carrying in the first place.
Unfortunately it is hard to measure the success of this preventive approach and all too easy to measure (and so press for more) arrests. Camden police are to be congratulated for their community approach in our area.
If we had more local authority funding we believe we could increase our contribution to more positive behaviour in the area
MICK FARRANT
Chair QCCA, Oak Village, NW5
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