§ Mr. TredinnickTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what proposals he has to reduce crime in rural areas, with particular reference to Leicestershire. [1425]
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§ Mr. DenhamTackling crime and the fear of crime is a clear priority for this Government. It applies to all areas, whether suburban, rural or inner-city, and our approach is to assist the police and the local crime and disorder partnerships to address local crime effectively.
We are providing increased funding for police forces covering rural areas to take account of the additional costs involved: £30 million is being allocated to 31 forces this year. The allocation for Leicestershire police is £433,516. In addition, the rural crime toolkit, on the Home Office's crime reduction website, provides a new resource to help local partnerships to address crime in rural areas.
The nine crime and disorder partnerships in Leicestershire are supporting a varied programme of crime reduction initiatives and projects as part of the Government's crime reduction programme. Each of the partnerships is bring provided with £10,000 from the crime reduction programme this year to help them to improve their performance in tackling crime in their areas. In addition, the partnerships in Leicestershire have received money to support closed circuit television initiatives, and they have been allocated £565,000 this year to tackle drug related crime. In November last year, Leicestershire received £341,000 for a project to tackle burglary in Leicester as part of the reducing burglary initiative, and £168,000 was awarded to eight forces, including Leicestershire, to tackle distraction burglary in central and eastern England as part of the targeted policing initiative.