Return to Agenda

ITEM EX14

EXECUTIVE – 7 DECEMBER 2004

COMMUNITY SAFETY STRATEGIES

Report by Director for Community Safety

1. This report:

• outlines the Council’s obligations under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998, and puts the current crime and community safety audits in context;
• summarises the issues identified by the crime and disorder audits undertaken by each of the five Oxfordshire Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships (CDRPs);
• considers the emerging issues from the associated consultation processes;
• identifies the outline approach to the new three year CDRP strategies, due for publication in April 2005;
• proposes arrangements for the final approval of the strategies, jointly with District Councils, Police and Primary Care Trusts.

2. The Crime & Disorder Act 1998 requires the County Council to work in partnership with District Councils, the Police and the Primary Care Trusts. These partnerships are the five Oxfordshire CDRPs, located in each district council area. They are required to produce three-year community safety, or crime and disorder reduction, strategies and the Council, along with its partners, must bring its services to bear in the delivery of the strategies and supporting action plans. This work is co-ordinated by the Council’s Safer Communities Unit, which acts as the liaison point with CDRP partner organisations. Working relationships are well developed with the Police, the District Councils, the Primary Care Trusts, as well as the Youth Offending Service, Probation and other partner agencies. The existing strategies were published in 2002.

The Process of Developing Strategies for 2005-08

3. Home Office Guidance sets out the steps leading to publication of the new CDRP strategies. Essentially there are 3 stages:

• Audit. The pooling and analysis of available data and information about the incidence of crime and factors affecting crime and community safety, leading to early identification of key issues for attention.
• Consultation. Communication with individuals and organisations in each partnership area to establish as far as possible how people’s experience matches the picture provided by the audit.
• Publication of strategies. The production of documents which take account of the audit information and consultation responses, and which outline the priority themes for each partnership area, along with intended outcomes, and where appropriate, targets to be achieved over the lifetime of the strategy. These strategies are subject to approval by this Council, the respective District Councils, Thames Valley Police Authority, and the respective PCT Boards. Detailed action plans are developed on a rolling basis thereafter.

4. To this end, work has been under way since summer 2004. The audits are mostly complete and consultation is under way. The County Council’s Citizens’ Panel has been used as a means of ensuring a representative sample of people from the whole county has its views reflected. More focused consultation has taken place with specific groups, for instance with young people through the Changing Places questionnaire, which was used during summer activities and play schemes; and with older people through the Older People’s Panel. The audit documents will be placed in the Members’ Resource Centre as they become available.
5. Draft strategies will have been produced by each CDRP by January 2005. The drafts will be placed in the Members’ Resource Centre as they become available. In line with the Home Office Guidance, they will need to strike a balance between local priorities, as informed by the audits and the consultation process, and national priorities, such as vehicle crime, domestic burglary, alcohol and drugs misuse, violent crime and anti-social behaviour). There will be PSA "All Crime" reduction targets assigned to each CDRP.

Issues Emerging from the Audits and Consultation

6. Since audits were initially conducted in 1998 and 2001 respectively, there has been a progressive increase in the amount and breadth of data and information made available by partner organisations. This has meant a significant improvement in the quality of audits, which are no longer overly-reliant on police recorded crime statistics. There is now reference, for instance, to data relating to Accident & Emergency admissions, educational achievement in schools, racial incidents reported, and anti-social behaviour.
7. Given the broad scope of the audits, what is set out here for each CDRP is merely a summary of the headline issues for each partnership area. It is important to note that issues are sometimes described and grouped in different ways by each CDRP. Essentially, this is a reflection of the local priorities that have emerged in consultation.
   
   

Cherwell	Oxford City	South Oxfordshire	Vale of White Horse	West Oxfordshire
Anti-social behaviour	All crime, reflecting a new Government PSA target	Anti-social behaviour	Anti-social behaviour	Anti-social behaviour, including criminal damage and environmental crime
Alcohol and drugs misuse	Violence against the person, including alcohol-related crime, domestic violence	Alcohol-related crime	Alcohol-related crime	Substance misuse, including alcohol and drugs, and licensing
Road safety, traffic and parking	Hate crime, which includes domestic violence, racially motivated crime and homophobic crime	Drug-related crime	Violent crime, including domestic violence	Violent crime, including the night time economy and domestic violence
Young people’s issues	Domestic burglary	Violent crime, including domestic violence	Environmental crime	Safe and supportive communities, including public reassurance, young people’s services, hate crime and road safety
Domestic violence	Vehicle crime	Property crime, including burglary and vehicle crime	Road Safety	Acquisitive crime, including burglary and vehicle crime
Hate crimes	Anti-social behaviour, including criminal damage	Road safety	Acquisitive crime
Burglary	Fear of crime		Fear of crime as a cross-cutting theme
Vehicle crime	Witness and victim support		Drug-related crime, reflecting national, more than local priorities
Fear of crime	Drug and alcohol misuse
	Young people’s issues
	Offence location

8. Some general points are worthy of note at this stage:

• There was a high response rate through the Citizen’s Panel (2,866 out of 3,000)
• West Oxfordshire remains a relatively safe place, with low recorded crime, making it 17^th safest of 376 CDRPs nationally.
• Oxford City remains a high crime area, with violent crime a significant concern.
• 50% of violent crime in Oxford City is related to alcohol misuse or domestic violence.
• Up to 94% of emergency admissions to A&E are alcohol-related.
• While violent crime has increased across the board, some of the increase may be due to the police recording standard having changed during the period of the 2002-2005 CDRP strategies.
• There has been a general fall in vehicle theft and domestic burglary across the county.

9. It is evident that there are some similarities in the strategies, as well as differences, reflecting the diversity of the county. Inevitably, some issues occur in all the draft strategies, reflecting the fact that problems must be tackled across district boundaries. During the period of the 2002-05 strategies, there has been increasing cross-county collaboration in dealing with issues of common concern. In the past year, there have been positive developments in cross-county working in relation to domestic violence, distraction burglary, licensing and anti-social behaviour, for instance. Various developments mean that this approach will feature significantly in the future: Thames Valley Police are in the process of establishing a Basic Command Unit for Oxfordshire; Oxfordshire Community Partnership has identified safe and supportive communities as one of its top three areas for attention; and community safety funding from the Government Office for the South East currently allocated through district councils is likely to be channelled through county councils from 2005/06.

Arrangements for Approval of the 2005-2008 Strategies

10. Each CDRP is currently progressing towards assembling of draft strategies, which will reflect the findings of the audits and issues emerging from consultation. These drafts will be available from January 2005, and they are then subject to approval by the council and its statutory partners.
11. It is envisaged that this will involve:

• Initial sanction of the outline framework by the Executive (at this meeting);
• Executive Member for Community Safety to agree draft strategies in early January 2005;
• Briefing for all county councillors on the draft strategies at a seminar in January;
• Consideration of draft strategies by Community Safety Scrutiny Committee on 14 February;
• Consideration by Executive on 15 March of Scrutiny views and recommendation to full Council;
• formal County Council approval of strategies on 5 April 2005.

12. The Executive is RECOMMENDED:

1. to endorse the framework outlined in the report for production of the new Crime and Disorder Reduction Strategies on the basis of the content of the CDRP audits and issues emerging from the associated consultation;
2. to authorise the Executive Member for Community Safety to agree draft CDRP strategies, on the advice of the Director for Community Safety and Safer Communities Unit, in early January 2005;
3. that further consideration of the draft strategies be given in March 2005, taking into account the views of the Community Safety Scrutiny Committee.

JOHN PARRY
Director for Community Safety

Background Papers: CDRP Audits – refer to the Oxfordshire Safer Communities Unit

Contact Officer: Bruce McLaren, Community Safety Manager, Tel 01865 258516

November 2004

Return to TOP