Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Gavin Williamson

Monday 9th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)]

15. What steps she has taken to empower local communities to tackle crime.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Lynne Featherstone)]

The Government are radically reforming the approach to tackling crime, shifting accountability away from Whitehall and directly to communities. We have provided the public with greater information, invested in neighbourhood policing and police community support officers, and increased direct accountability through beat meetings. This year, the public will be empowered through the election of police and crime commissioners—a landmark reform of policing that will increase accountability at the local level.

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[Gavin Williamson]

In Codsall, we have had to deal with a recent traumatic event when our scout hut was subjected to an arson attack following a period of antisocial activity in its vicinity. Does the Minister agree that the community triggers will go a long way towards empowering local communities such as those in Codsall to make sure that such things do not happen in the future?

[Lynne Featherstone]

It is upsetting when, after a number of complaints, a situation ends in something like an arson attack on a scout hut. It is very upsetting for the local community. Many police forces, councils and social landlords are working hard to deal with antisocial behaviour, but there are cases where communities report this same problem over and over again, and nothing is done. My hon. Friend is exactly right: the community trigger will ensure that, if necessary, everyone has a clear and simple way of making sure that the authorities take a problem seriously before it escalates.