Agenda item

To be presented by Sergeant Oliver Brixey regarding South West Chilterns.

Sergeant Oliver Brixey, Marlow NHPT, Princess Risborough NHPT, Chepping Valley NHPT, provided a presentation, appended to the minutes. The Sergeant informed the community of all of the areas that were covered by the Neighbourhood Policing Team which included fraud prevention, safeguarding, school talks, knife crime and serious violence, burglaries, anti-social behaviour, rural crime, violence against women and girls, licenced premises, night-time economy, social media and communication. The four priorities as agreed by the community were highlighted as being Anti-social behaviour, Speeding and Anti-social driving, Burglary and Rural Crime. Sergeant Brixey went through some statistics for the priorities, for the Marlow area but informed the community that this information could be found for any area on the Police.UK website (https://www.police.uk/pu/your-area).

The following points were raised at the meeting:

·       Crime Solving Rates – how many crimes were being solved and were these rates reported anywhere. The Sergeant informed all that there was a six-month backlog so any figures reported would be out of date as soon as published and therefore would be incorrect.

·       Rural Crime – there had been 14 break-ins in the past week indicating an increase in organised crime. Anyone reporting the crimes were not hearing back from the police and finding it very frustrating. Sergeant Brixey commented that increasing visibility was being investigated and an operation would be running over the weekend. Anyone that reported a crime was kept updated on changes, it was difficult to disclose information whilst cases were under investigation.

·       Fraud – How could action fraud be reported and stopped. Sergeant Brixey reported that fraud was not recorded by Thames Valley Police, it was recorded nationally. There was a specific team, the Fraud Unit, in place that dealt with scams and fraud, including overseas fraud.

·       Communication – It was suggested that Councillors, Parish Councils and Town Councils be used to disseminate information to the community as the channels were already in place. Thames Valley Police were looking to improving the ways for alerting the community. A quarterly newsletter for Parishes, Town Councils and Councillors was being designed. The Neighbourhood Watch team was going to assist with TV alerts.  

·       Parking Enforcement – when residents contact the police, they are informed that they need to contact the Council. Residents wanted to know who to contact. Sergeant Brixey commented that the Council were responsible for parking regulations and the police were responsible for dangerous situations caused by parking. The Chairman informed the Community Board that since this was a repeat offense, he had escalated to the Police Commissioner.

·       Nitrogen Oxide Cannisters – There were specific hotspots in the area, could these be patrolled, and fines issued to repeat offenders? Sergeant Brixey informed all that patrols had been directed to the risk areas.

·       Reporting – Was there a database where incidents from the area were recorded and residents could see these? Sergeant Brixey reported that minor incidents were not recoded but major, serious incidents that were being investigated were recorded. There was an online reporting tool for residents to use on the Thames Valley Police website (https://www.thamesvalley.police.uk/ro/report/ocr/af/how-to-report-a-crime)

·       Priorities – It was interesting to see the priorities of TVP, had the community been involved in setting the priorities of the area? Sergeant Brixey commented that the TVP priorities had been set from the ‘have your say’ comments. There had been a recent merger of two local police areas, so the priorities were now being reviewed.

The Chairman thanked Sergeant Brixey for attending and providing a presentation and asked residents to submit any further questions to Makyla Devlin (Community Board Co-ordinator) on email Makyla.Devlin@buckinghamshire.gov.uk