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Police talk to youngsters at Barrington Court |
‘I warned that estate patrols faced attacks’
CCTV worker says Town Hall told him to take up fears with private firm
THE Town Hall refused to address health and safety warnings the day before a housing patrol officer was hit by a brick thrown from a tower block balcony, the New Journal has learned.
Camden Council maintains that safety is the concern of the private firm employing the patrols.
Two housing officers were injured by stones or bricks thrown at them as they patrolled Barrington Court – a 10-storey block in the centre of the network of estates around Lismore Circus, Gospel Oak – on separate nights in March. One needed hospital treatment.
But GMB trade union representative Selim Erderel, who works in the borough’s CCTV control room, wrote to senior council housing managers after the first attack and just 24 hours before the second, warning that staff levels and lack of supervision were creating hazards.
He told them: “Recently, a brick was thrown at [patrol officer’s name] head in which he was hospitalised and could have been killed, of course this happening in the absence of a supervisor on patrol.
“Risk assessments are inadequate as they don’t reflect structural changes in the team. They should be constantly reviewed.”
A housing manager responded with a one-line email suggesting he raise his concerns with his employer.
Mr Erderel is employed by Broadland Guarding Services, a Norwich-based security company which won a three-year contract to run Camden’s CCTV monitoring and housing and parks patrols last year, against union resistance.
Mr Erderel said he had been “astonished” to read the council’s statement about the stoning incident in the New Journal last week, in which a spokeswoman said: “The council and its partners take the health and safety of staff very seriously and in particular in the light of the recent incidents.”
Mr Erderel said: “This is hypocrisy. They knew there had already been someone nearly blinded. Sooner or later someone is going to get killed. There has been hostility towards housing officers since the introduction of anti-social behaviour legislation and they are at risk.”
Yesterday (Wednesday), the council said the safety of housing patrols was the concern of private contractor employers. A press officer said the council met Broadland on a monthly basis to monitor the contract, but that changes to staffing levels on patrols were made after the second attack “as a result of consultation” with the contractor. “We monitor the contractor – we still have a responsibility through that monitoring,” she added.
A Broadland employee referred all inquiries to Camden Council.
Housing patrols are continuing to “double up” on visits to the area, patrolling in groups of four or more.
Police were also out in force in Barrington Court on Tuesday, searching and questioning children and teenagers.
Although most people agree that tensions have been rising in the area in the last month, they disagree about the cause.
Sgt Chris Downes, head of Gospel Oak Safer Neighbourhoods team, said on Tuesday that efforts to reduce crime and anti-social behaviour in Queen’s Crescent may have meant some displacement of problems into residential areas. |
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