Community Cohesion (Lancashire) (Hansard, 27 January 2003)

§ Mr. Denham

Lancashire Constabulary has conducted successful operations to deal with major criminal activities which affect the community, such as drug dealing, burglary and car crime. The Chief Constable's July 2002 Constabulary Ambition Statement for Lancashire gives priority to leadership, resource management, communication, community engagement and delivering results. All are important for the promotion of community cohesion, which is central to the work of the police across the country and particularly in areas with fragmented communities.

Specific steps being taken by Lancashire Constabulary include: community beat managers in strategic areas around the county, particularly in Burnley and Pendle, each with responsibility for a particular area, providing a constant link with the public, dealing with community issues and reducing crime; they are also the best link with young people, and help respond to rumours and provide reassurance. To raise their profile, they are having a new uniform insignia, and commitment is being made to continuity by not redeploying them to other duties and by maintaining individuals in post for a minimum of two years; the proactive work of the newly-formed hate crime unit in Burnley and Pendle, which has significantly improved detection rates for racially aggravated violent crime, enhancing community confidence; the community and race relations (CRR) strategy incorporates youth issues, responses to racial incidents and crimes, ensuring equitable service delivery and developing the recruitment, retention and progression of staff with regard to CRR and cohesion issues through training; intelligence-led problem-oriented approaches, at all levels of policing and in all departments, which involve monitoring tension indicators and other threats to public safety and working in partnership with outside agencies and members of the public; and community safety teams in each of the six divisions, with a central strategic team at headquarters, dedicated to working on community-based projects, particularly those that relate to minority communities; the teams work to reassure the public, provide communities with a link to the police, deal with hate crime and gather intelligence on community tensions.

I would like to express appreciation of the work of Lancashire Constabulary in these and other measures implementing the recommendations of the Burnley Taskforce (Clarke report), of the Cantle report and of the Ministerial Group on Public Safety and Community Cohesion following the summer 2001 disturbances in 698W Burnley. This has been taken forward by a multi-agency forum with local authorities and other agencies, with a view to ensuring effective partnership working.