Residents and Neighbourhood Watch Meeting with Police

- Thu 1st Jun 2006

Community Centre, West Town

Around 25 local residents and NW sector controllers met at the Community Centre to discuss the recent spate of vandalism on Hayling Island.

The Police were represented by (Acting) Inspector Ian Grey, plus also Duncan Hague and Phil Baron.   The Police Authority also attended the meeting.

Portsmouth News sent a reporter (who interviewed residents after the meeting) and a cameraman who took photographs of the proceedings.

Councillor John Smith attended in the audience.

The meeting was opened by the Chairperson (Mrs Jan Mitchell) who expressed great concern over the recent events of “mindless vandalism” that had occurred over the Island and in particular around Eastoke on Saturday night.

Inspector Grey confirmed that since Wednesday 24th May, there had been 65 crimes of this nature on Hayling Island.  He said that there were no suspects as yet, and that the Eastoke crimes in particular were proving difficult to investigate since the majority of the vehicle owners were caravanners who were only on the Island at the weekend. 

He went on to try and re-assure the residents about the policing strategy.  Unmarked police cars are being used for patrols after midnight – and indeed arrests were made in the early hours of Sunday morning by such officers.  However this was not as Eastoke as the officers were targeting a different part of the Island.

Inspector Grey appealed to residents to come forward with any information about these crimes using either local Policemen as contacts, or via the national police number of 0845 0454545 or the  Crimestoppers number 0845 555111. 

Mrs Mitchell expressed the need for all residents to join the local Neighbourhood Watch scheme, and made leaflets available to the attendees.

Several members of the audience, some with local businesses and some retired residents, expressed frustration at the lack of police presence on the Island.  Inspector Grey explained that he could only utilise the resources he had – and both officers attending with him gave details of the lengthy hours that they had worked since the spate of crimes this weekend.

Inspector Grey also pointed out that the Community Safety Officers are now a part of the policing structure – although when questioned further he admitted that all the crimes of vandalism had taken part between the hours of midnight and 4 am, which is outside the CSO working hours.

The meeting was asked to have an open mind about the source of the vandalism, since the Police are by no means sure that these are committed by juveniles.   Indeed the arrests at the weekend for vandalism were all of adults and not of youngsters.   Inspector Grey had received information from Northampton Police force who had experienced similar tyre slashing problems recently.  When the offender was caught, he was an elderly gentleman who suddenly had started damaging property in this way.

Inspector Grey was asked to quantify the number of man hours each week devoted to policing Hayling between the hours of midnight and 6am.  He was unable to do so but said that he could provide this information inside a couple of days.

He was asked how residents could convince the higher authorities in the Police force that more resources were needed on Hayling.   He gave the name of Superintendent Peter Goodall at Fareham as being the top of the local police tree.    He also confirmed that there are 10 “response” officers for Hayling, albeit only two of them are residents on the Island.

Inspector Grey and his team were thanked from the audience for attending at such short notice – and the meeting closed at 8.45pm.

By forum user, HIbot