Forum topic: PG Ward Panel (CAPE) April 2024

At this latest panel, slightly smaller due to school holiday absences, we were joined by PG’s new Inspector, adding knowledge and emphasising the Met’s increasing focus on community policing and community led policing.

We received a brief presentation from a member of the CHIPS street safety team. Historically focused on schoolchildren, particularly those transitioning from junior to secondary, CHIPS is now expanding to include all vulnerable people whatever their age. I’m hoping this definition applies to the Spurs defense when they visit Newcastle this coming Saturday. The next stage is the building of a portfolio of venues where our SNT will work with CHIPS to emphahsise the value and importance of the scheme..

Reported crime data for Q1 had many welcome features: burglaries, residential and non-residential, all but disappeared; motor vehicle crime remains an issue, as it is countrywide, but trends are clearly down; while everything else was either flat or marginally below previous figures.

Most startling was that roughly two thirds of all reported crime categories were linked to Green Lanes (and Aldermans Hill parade). The area has a much greater footfall / concentration of people so possibly it is no surprise it would see most crime, but we all were struck by the relative volume. While not crime free, all the remainder of PG was experiencing perhaps 15 crimes of various scale, mostly minor, a month. The probability is your own street was nil.

A recommendation is not to use your phone without being very aware of your surroundings and not to leave it on eg a café tabletop. The same applies to making sure personal item such as travel cards, purses and the like are secure.  If you are an individual who takes £3-5000 out of one of our banks in cash them maybe don’t tuck it into your bag and then go for a coffee. This one is an all too regular feature of the stats I see.

On reported crime, PG is not a statistical problem area within Enfield however much some will talk it so. Some Edmonton wards take that unfortunate position which does mean they get most police resource.  But as the police at every meeting and at every level continue to emphasise, without reporting they are unnecessarily blinded.  So, we all need to report every time – offered a set of I pods on Green Lanes? 101 it. Beggars on the A406? 101 it. Looks like a drugs deal car or you’re seeing drugs used outside a cafe? 101 it. An alternative is to report online  https://www.met.police.uk/ or anonymously via crime stoppers.   

As well as providing the police with intelligence, potentially to aggregate with other reports, or link to a known offender, it helps give a true picture of what is happening in PG and so be more likely to lead to the appropriate level of police resource in our area. Such reports can also add weight to police input to eg licensing requests / renewals.

Our local police can and do pull in extra resource where there seems to be a problem and here the CAPE – representatives of the PG community -  feed in what we see and what we hear from you all.

Drugs is a common comment and while reported incidents are small (only 7 in Q1) no one believes that is reflective of the scale of the matter. Drug use has two necessary sides: supply and demand. The focus of expectation is often on the supply side but not recently in PG where a police team supported by two trained drugs dogs “welcomed” commuters at our station. So busy were the dogs that it was necessary to put them back in their cages while the six police caught up with the human backlog.    

More big footprint stuff can be expected because we’ve a supportive local police team and a CAPE group of locals on the right side of angry with how things are versus how they could be.

Your own actions – report incidents, and maybe look to join CAPE.    

"What began as a report of luggage theft led to Metropolitan Police detectives identifying and foiling a drugs importation gang."


https://enfielddispatch.co.uk/two-southgate-drug-dealers-among-four-jailed-after-international-operation-foiled-by-cops/ 

I've been a bit broken record on the often unexpected benefits of reporting whatevers to the police. Here's a surprising local link in such a vein from our free paper. 

If you've been following Karl's posts about the Palmers Green ward panel (aka CAPE) and the types of crime (eg shoplifting) and anti-social behaviour that are prevalent here, plus the problems encountered not far away with car meets racing along roads or in superstore car parks, then this BBC Radio 4 discussion will be of interest, as it brings together some experienced and thoughtful panelists.

No surprise to learn that exactly the same issues are happening throughout London and in towns across the country. No surprise either to hear that the cutbacks in policing and funding of local authorities that have been made in the cause of "austerity" over the past decade and a half have have not only impacted negatively on everyday life for many but have also turned out to be false economies. By stopping funding positive things that improve the lives of young people, for example, we end up forking out more just to clean up the resulting mess, and this in turn leads to further budget cuts and we find ourselves in a vicious circle.

The programme's title is "Are we failing victims of anti-social behaviour?" So who is the "we" here? The answer that emerges seems to be the police and courts (to varying extents around the country), councils and the government - but ultimately of course we all have some responsibility in this as in other areas of life.

Click here to listen to the programme (available for the next 30 days)