High visibility community policing patrols in Luton 'difficult to sustain' now that Operation Foresight is over

Bedfordshire's Police and Crime Commissioner is concerned about how community policing continues in Luton, now that a pre-Christmas operation is over.

During Operation Foresight, Luton's community policing team was joined by officers from other units to carry out high visibility patrols around the town to "reassure" shoppers and businesses in the town centre.

When asked if Operation Foresight would be continuing, the PCC, Festus Akinbusoye, said: "Because of the amount of resources that are deployed into that I’d be surprised if that will be an ongoing activity.

"When you have these short bursts of intervention they do tend to have an impact. I’d love to be able to have it continue, but from an operational point of view, it would be up to the chief constable to decide that.

"From a resourcing point of view it is very difficult to sustain. What I am much more concerned about is what is being left behind.

"Are the community officers who are responsible for the South Ward, which covers the town centre, being allowed to remain focused and dedicated to those kind of patrols that they were doing, albeit with other partners coming in to give them a hand as well, and the answer is yes," he said.

The PCC said community officers have been deployed to specific areas and targeting hotspot areas.

He added that these officers know the key troublemakers in their areas, and he is keen that they are not sent to other areas of policing, so they can continue to focus on community policing.

The PCC said he's told the chief constable that communities want to see visible policing, but not just officers in patrol cars.

"But coming out of their cars and walking around, talking to people, talking to shops, talking to businesses, and being visible, catching criminals, putting them away, that’s what we want them to be doing," he said.

"And they are doing that now, they are actually doing good old traditional style policing that many of us want the police to do.

"The numbers might not be the same as when doing Op Foresight, but those that you’ve got there, they will be able to focus on having a presence.

The PCC said it's not just about enforcement, it's also about helping those that need help.

"When I was out of patrol with some of those officers, they knew a lot of the beggars by name, some of them even knew the officers by name, actually by their first name," he said.

"What these people need is help, so I’m now pushing the force to provide me with details on how well our officers are using out of court disposals to actually assist these people to into rehab.

"I’m looking to the local authorities as well to see what services can be commissioned. So rather than to enforcing with the police, these services will actually work with these individuals while they are on the streets and literally be a buddy with them to go to resolutions, such as rehab.

"So that is something I’m looking at because that would ease up a lot of police time, a lot," he said.