Agenda and minutes

Crime and Disorder Sub-Committee - Wednesday, 25th November, 2020 2.00 pm

Venue: Virtual - Online meeting. View directions

Note: If you wish to attend the Committee please email memberservices@northdevon.gov.uk by noon Monday 23 November 2020. This will be a virtual meeting and will be conducted in line with The Local Authorities and Police and Crime Panels (Coronavirus) (Flexibility of Local Authority and Police and Crime Panel Meetings) (England and Wales) Regulations 2020. Please be aware that when you take part in a virtual meeting your phone number and/or your email address will be visible to councillors and officers of North Devon Council attending the committee but will not be visible to members of the public or others. This is required to allow you to be identified on Microsoft Teams, the software used by the Council to hold virtual committees, and will not be used for any other purpose by the Council. For more information, or to exercise your rights, please see www.northdevon.gov.uk/privacy.

Items

No.

Item

Virtual meeting etiquette and procedure

Chair to report

Minutes:

The Corporate and Community Services Officer outlined the virtual meeting procedure and etiquette as well as confirming who was in attendance from North Devon Council.

Apologies for Absence

Minutes:

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Henderson and Orange.

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the meeting held on 31st October 2019 PDF 205 KB

(attached)

Minutes:

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on 31^st October 2019 (circulated previously) be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chair.

Items brought forward which in the opinion of the Chair should be considered by the meeting as a matter of urgency.

Minutes:

The Chair allowed Councillor Mack to address the committee. Due to Covid-19 the normal ceremony to mark domestic abuse survivors was unable to proceed a white ribbon was worn to recognise domestic abuse violence and its survivors.

Declarations of Interests.

(Please telephone the Corporate and Community Services team to prepare a form for your signature before the meeitng. Interests must be re-declared when the item is called, and Councillors must leave the room if necessary).

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interest made.

Update on the North Devon and Torridge Community Safety Partnership PDF 250 KB

Report by Environmental Public Health and Housing Manager (TDC), (attached)

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Commander for North and West Devon Police and was the Chair of the Torridge and North Devon Crime Safety Partnership agency, presented the Update on the North Devon and Torridge Community Safety Partnership report (circulated previously).

The Sub-Committee received the following updates:

· The Crime and Disorder Act came into law in 1998 and its aim was to improve community safety

· Local Authorities administrated this law and made safety happen. Technically Torridge and North Devon were two Crime Safety Partnerships but were working together as one

· The Partnership met as a wider group quarterly. The other partners who met were the Police, Fire authority, Northern Devon Healthcare Trust, Local Authorities, elected Members, representatives from Domestic Abuse, drug and alcohol services

· The Partnership had a duty to consider national issues such as County Lines and Modern Day Slavery along with local issues

· Funding of the Partnership was due to change next year, 2021, whereby bids would have to be made for each area of concern to be tackled

· There had been many hurdles during the last year such as Covid-19, and relocating the police station but Crime levels were down by 13%, whereas nationally this figure was a 5% drop

· The number of drug trafficking and weapons crimes had increased. The positive of this was that more criminals were being caught and the Police were being more pro-active

· Hate crime had also increased and was a worrying trend

· The increased anti-social behaviour levels were due to the Covid-19 restrictions

· The Torridge and North Devon area remained one of the safest places to live

Dean Smith, Community Safety Lead Officer and Anti-Social Behaviour Lead for Torridge District Council (TDC) then addressed the Sub-Committee to give a Community Safety Partnership update.

The Sub-Committee received the following updates:

· TDC worked closely with its partners, 1-2 hour training sessions were given on any rising issues. Unfortunately since March 2020 these sessions had been suspended due to the Covid-19 restrictions.

· Online sessions were hoped to resume soon with a session having been successfully delivered recently on issues around cyber safety and scams

· 2021 would see the launch of a virtual platform programme

· Mediation services were used frequently by colleagues in the Environmental Health team who were dealing with increased neighbour disputes

· Crime prevention tools due to close working with the local Police

· Road safety was recognised as an emerging threat and attendance at regular meetings on Road Safety were ongoing

· Support of the operation SNAP, which allowed members of the public to upload dash cam footage to help tackle dangerous driving on the roads

· Contributed to the Honest Truth scheme which relayed road safety messages

The Sub-Committee then heard from Police Sergeant Noel Bourke, based at the North Devon Council (NDC) offices and who covered Torridge and North Devon.

The following updates were given:

· There were four areas of work he was involved with and these were:

(1) County Lines

(2) Modern Slavery

(3) Safer Towns

(4) Mental Health

· There had been ... view the full minutes text for item 6.