Police chief seeks successor to axed SNT meetings
Tuesday, 3rd March 2015.
Haverhill's chief policeman wants the public to tell him the best way to liaise with them in the wake of the demise of Safer Neighbourhood Team public forums.
Insp Peter Ferrie said Haverhill had led the way in Suffolk in the quarterly SNT meetings, which set priorities for police to concentrate on, with live streaming and online voting.
They had often had 30 to 40 attending and as many following online, he said, but in many other parts of the county, hardly anyone turned up, so the constabulary had decided to do away with the system.
That left him with the job of working out a way to liaise with the public in a similar manner.
The old system had resulted in priorities which he described as 'not smart', and which were unachievable, so the aim was to come up with a replacement which gave the public the chance to have their input, but which set effective priorities.
A sort of community liaison meeting was a possibility, he said, and he was working with the team which had organised the SNT meetings locally to come up with an exact format.
Suffolk police have been told they must cut £20.5million from their costs over the next five years, a target which Insp Ferrie said meant they would not be able to carry out all the functions they had done up to now.
Already there were plans for Suffolk County Council decriminalise parking offences within 12 to 18 months, so they would no longer be the responsibility of the police to enforce. Suffolk and Cambridgeshire are among the last few counties in the country which have not done this yet.
Insp Ferrie said he wanted his officers to concentrate on more serious issues, particularly domestic violence, which was a significant problem in Haverhill, and to identify whether there wee other issues like child sex exploitation or human trafficking existing in the town.
He said he was open to any ideas about liaison meetings and it was 'a good opportunity to find something better'.
Insp Peter Ferrie said Haverhill had led the way in Suffolk in the quarterly SNT meetings, which set priorities for police to concentrate on, with live streaming and online voting.
They had often had 30 to 40 attending and as many following online, he said, but in many other parts of the county, hardly anyone turned up, so the constabulary had decided to do away with the system.
That left him with the job of working out a way to liaise with the public in a similar manner.
The old system had resulted in priorities which he described as 'not smart', and which were unachievable, so the aim was to come up with a replacement which gave the public the chance to have their input, but which set effective priorities.
A sort of community liaison meeting was a possibility, he said, and he was working with the team which had organised the SNT meetings locally to come up with an exact format.
Suffolk police have been told they must cut £20.5million from their costs over the next five years, a target which Insp Ferrie said meant they would not be able to carry out all the functions they had done up to now.
Already there were plans for Suffolk County Council decriminalise parking offences within 12 to 18 months, so they would no longer be the responsibility of the police to enforce. Suffolk and Cambridgeshire are among the last few counties in the country which have not done this yet.
Insp Ferrie said he wanted his officers to concentrate on more serious issues, particularly domestic violence, which was a significant problem in Haverhill, and to identify whether there wee other issues like child sex exploitation or human trafficking existing in the town.
He said he was open to any ideas about liaison meetings and it was 'a good opportunity to find something better'.
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