4 July 2008, 08/148
Crime figures slashed
A challenging three-year target to reduce a number of top
priority crimes in West Lancashire has been exceeded according to
the latest figures.
West Lancashire Community Safety
Partnership is celebrating after finding out it had achieved its
Public Service Agreement 1 target with a reduction of 23.1%.
The Public Service Agreement targets are set by the Government
and include a group of key crimes that they want partnerships to
focus on, such as: common assault, wounding, domestic burglary,
robbery, damage to vehicles, theft of a vehicle, theft from a
vehicle, theft from a person, arson, vehicle interference and theft
of a pedal cycle.
The Government originally set West Lancashire a three-year
target to reduce these types of crimes by 15% by March 2008. The
Partnership offered to make this an 18.5% reduction as tackling
crime is a key issue for the local community and the partnership
was confident it could deliver.
So to achieve a 23.1% reduction in this cluster of crimes has
surpassed even their own ambitions and expectations!
In fact, the Council’s Chief Executive Bill Taylor led a
community-wide team which ensured that the stunning results in West
Lancashire were replicated across Lancashire.
Cllr Paul Greenall, Portfolio Holder for Community Safety, said:
"Tackling crime and the fear of crime is one of our biggest
priorities and we did set ourselves a challenge in order to keep
West Lancashire safe, so these results are a tremendous achievement
against what was a big ask for us. This achievement is a credit to
all partners and everyone should be really pleased."
Now the Community Safety Partnership has a bigger challenge
ahead! They have been set a further task by the Government to
reduce criminal damage by a further 10% by March 2009.
As a result, partners are planning to step up their actions to
reduce criminal damage, which is a real blight on local
communities.
Bill Taylor, Chairman of the WLCSP, said: "Criminal damage
affects so many people personally, it costs money and spoils the
quality of life of communities, which is why we are working hard
with our partners to come up with a range of action plans to reduce
criminal damage. We have a good track record of partnership working
and we know that if we work together and ask communities work with
us to be extra vigilant and report any incidents we can win the
fight against this mindless act!"
To find out more about the work of the West Lancashire Community
Safety Partnership, visit the our community safety pages.
Related information
> Community Safety Partnership
> Police and Communities Together
> Neighbourhood Watch