Annual Report 2018 - 2019 Camden Safer Neighbourhood Board c/o Somers Town Community Centre 150 Ossulston Street London NW1 1EE 020 7383 0000 [email protected] camdenconnected,com A Company Limited by Guarantee, Registered in England and Wales, No. 5348915. Registered Charity No. 1111175 Roy Walker – Chair Over 2017 and into 2018 moped- By the end of the year we were enabled crime reached worryingly pleased to note that concerted high levels. Communities were Partnership operations led to concerned with the brazen significant month-on-month manner in which these young men reductions in moped-enabled crime. carried out their robberies. They By the beginning of 2019 it had were also deeply worried about reduced to a level that it was no the escalation of the violence longer a Partnership strategic used, particularly the increase use priority. of knives and corrosive substances. It had reached such With Camden being a central a level that the Community Safety London Borough and home to a Partnership Board made moped- number of busy iconic locations, the enabled crime a strategic priority. threat of terrorism is ever present. On Thursday 6 September we held We themed our meeting held on an event at Somers Town Tuesday 12 June at Pax Lodge in Community Centre where we heard Hampstead on this new priority. We from the Met about the likelihood of heard from the Police and Council a terrorism attack, what to look out what actions they had been for and what to do in the event of an undertaking not only to halt the attack: escalation, but to reduce the overall volume of such crimes. The Police • RUN : Escape if you can. If there dispelled the myth spread by the is a safe route, RUN, if not hide. media that the Police did not pursue Insist others go with you. Don’t let people on scooters when they them slow you down. Leave removed their helmets. Residents belongings behind. were particularly supportive of the Police use of “Tactical Contact” • HIDE : If you can’t run, HIDE. Find when pursuing mopeds. cover from gunfire. Be aware of your exits. Try not to get trapped. Your voice for a safer Camden 1 Be quiet, silence your phone. Following extensive community Lock/barricade yourself in. Move engagement and talking to people away from the door. working with young people, in October 2018 the Taskforce • TELL : Call 999 when you are published an in-depth report of their safe. Location; where are the findings. The report contained 17 suspects? Direction; where did recommendations under the you last see the suspects? headings of Prevent, Identify, Descriptions – Numbers, features, Disrupt, Support and Enforce. These weapons etc. Further information finding were backed up with the – Casualties, type of injury, Youth Safety Fund where schools building information, entrances, and Community organisations could exits etc. Can you safely stop apply for two year funding totalling others from entering the area? £500,000. Abdul Hai and Keir Starmer presented the report to the Throughout the year the CSNB CSNB at our event held on Trustees and members continually Wednesday 28 November at the raised concerns about young people British Library. getting involved in criminal gangs, particularly with regard to drug The bedrock of the CSNB is our dealing and the associated use of ward-based Safer Neighbourhoods violence. We were extremely pleased Panels (SNPs). They hold invaluable when Camden Council established knowledge regarding crime and the Youth Safety Taskforce headed antisocial behaviour in their areas. by Councillor Abdul Hai and Sir Keir SNP members constitute the largest Starmer MP. group of both our membership and Community Representative Trustees on the CSNB. Your voice for a safer Camden 2 The CSNB is keen to support the I would like to thank my fellow continued development of SNPs. To Trustees for the time they have enable this we worked with Camden invested into the Camden SNB with Police to organise a forum for the aim of making Camden safer; sharing best practice. The twice- Leon Ellenport, our Vice Chair and yearly event took place on Monday Treasurer for his work looking after 14 January, and was open to all our finances, plus his work as our SNP Chairs and Vice Chairs. Counter Terrorism lead and his work Our final public event of the year with the London-wide Met was held on Wednesday 27 March Command and Control; my other at Ort House in Camden Town. This Vice Chair, Chris Fagg, for leading event revisited a ‘Status Dogs’ on the night-time economy and for meeting we held 10 years previous attending the monthly ‘Partnership at a time when people were growing afternoons’; John Kilvington, for concerned about dogs being used chairing the Stop and Search as weapons. It was a lively event Monitoring Group and attending the with over 65 people in attendance. London-wide Stop and Search We heard from Camden Dog Hub Community Monitoring Network. about their successes in promoting Finally I would like to thank Miles and supporting dog ownership Seaman for producing regular crime through training, advice and reports using the MOPAC behaviour modification programmes. dashboard. The simple to At that event we were pleased to understand crime trends Miles welcome back Chief Superintendent produce provide a valuable insight Raj Kohli as our new Borough into the direction of travel of crime in Commander. the Borough. Safer Neighbourhood Board functions 1 Establish policing priorities in the 6 Play a significant role in Community borough; Payback, whereby young people with 2 Monitor crime performance and minor convictions mitigate their community confidence; sentences by supervised work in the community; 3 Monitor complaints against borough officers; 7 Ensure all wards have a ward panel; 4 Hear and monitor complaints from 8 Oversee the borough Independent victims of crime Advisory Group; 5 Provide assurance that a system of 9 Support Neighbourhood Watch; independent custody visiting is 10 Ensure the stop and search community delivered; monitoring function is delivered. Your voice for a safer Camden 3 Residents from across the Borough had left a gap in our overall budget. Safety Views was an excellent project where residents told us of their crime and antisocial behaviour concerns. We passed the Residents’ concerns on to the Police and Council. We then fed back to residents what the authorities had done to address the concerns raised. We were so concerned about the loss of this much appreciated service that our Chair Roy Walker, our Projects Manager Peter Ward and I held a meeting Leon Ellenport with senior officers from Camden Treasurer’s Report 2018/19 Council in the hope of reinstating this funding. Unfortunately our pleas In 2018/19 the Camden Safer were unsuccessful. To make matters Neighbourhood Board received worse the Council also refused to core funding of £5,200 from the fund our Community Safety Mayor’s Office for Policing and Partnership Strategic Assessment Crime (MOPAC). This funding Focus Groups that we had been contributed towards the day-to- running for many years. This was a day administrative support of the further loss of £7,000 which meant Camden Safer Neighbourhood we had to use £12,520 from our Board (CSNB). The CSNB reserves. received a further £24,930 project funding from MOPAC giving at We continued to receive £15,500 total grant £30,130. This was used from the Community Safety to organise our programme of Partnership for our Stop and Search public events. Despite making work and on a positive note going representations to MOPAC about forward, in 2019/20 the Council has fairer funding for CSNB, they provided £23,500 a year for two refused to fund the CSNB to the years from their Youth Violence same level as Islington SNB, Taskforce funding for our Youth despite both SNBs coming under Independent Advisors. Central North Borough Command Unit. Over the past six years We finished 2018/19 with only Islington SNB has received over £25,740 in our reserves. We have £27,000 more than CSNB. faced more challenging financial situations over the past 30 years The loss of £40,000 from Camden and I believe we may have turned a Council for ‘Safety Views’ our corner. quarterly survey undertaken using Your voice for a safer Camden 4 Miles Seaman Trustee’s Lead for Crime Data & Performance CSNB has continued to regularly MOPAC dashboards. review the statistical data that is available on activities relating to For each CSNB meeting the crime in within Camden. To do database has been utilised to this the databases and analysis present information on issues of tools made available by MOPAC significance with respect to public have been used. The data has perception. Hence during this year comprised breakdown of some focus has been put on violent information for the main crime and in particular knife crime. categories of crime that have The peak witnessed in the previous been reported on for the last 10 year and the significant decline was years and more. This has been an evident feature of the figures in utilised by MOPAC to populate the database. Some decline in databases which can be analysed overall and specific Sanctioned using a dynamic software tool called Detection rate was also noted. Tableau which enables presentation of the data utilising selected filters so Some specific data on the volume of that the data can be analysed on Fraud and Forgery in the borough both a geographical and crime type (often the result of ‘scams’) became basis. Hence on the occasions when available from separate sources CSNB has met, up to date crime which illustrate the fact that this is data has been presented utilising the becoming a major crime concern.