£500,000 in targeted funding for North Yorkshire Police from new government Safer Streets Fund
July 29, 2020
North Yorkshire Police has been awarded £548,980 as its share of the government’s new £25 million Safer Streets Fund.
The Safer Streets Fund was an important Conservative manifesto commitment at the December 2019 general election to improve general security in communities especially impacted by ‘acquisitive crime’ such as car theft, robbery and burglary.
This is a targeted programme to assist local police forces in focusing on those crimes that members of the public are most likely to be affected by, aiming to protect homeowners and deter criminals. It will finance small local measures which together can have a big impact on crime levels, such as more street lighting and CCTV, establishing new community wardens and Neighbourhood Watch schemes, and ensuring locked gates around alleyways.
North Yorkshire’s share of the Fund will pay for a pilot project in the Whitley ward of Selby tackling burglary and rural crimes like hare coursing. This should enable the force to learn lessons and trial approaches which can then be used more widely across the county.
After learning of this, Julian said: “I warmly welcome this specialised funding injection for our local force, focused on those crimes which are especially distressing for residents.
I suspect many of the measures that can be tried out in Whitley with this new investment could be very usefully applied to the outlying communities and rural surrounds that form much of the York Outer constituency, and I will be watching with interest to see how this pilot can benefit out city.
This new money is a further down payment on the government’s election commitment to beef up law enforcement, coming after the 58 new frontline officers for North Yorkshire announced in the autumn, our share of the first of three tranches of the 20,000 more police Ministers are recruiting.
Our local police have played an invaluable role throughout the ongoing coronavirus response, and I will continue to work to ensure they have the tools and resources they need to keep us all safe.”
