People want security. They - we all - want peaceful, safe lives, in communities that work. Social stability, achieved through social justice, and via sensible civic and neighbourhood organisations.
When there is well-being in our community, then there is low crime. When there is low crime, there is well-being.
Achieving these things – achieving community safety and well-being – is at the heart of the Green vision for a Norwich metropolitan area with high quality of life, and low crime.
Prevention is better than cure
For Greens, the priority is always pro-actively to improve quality of life. Enforcement is and should only be for when things go wrong. Thus our Crime and Community Safety strategy is above all a preventing crime strategy.
There is overwhelming evidence that it is tackling the causes of crime – such as lack of remunerated work, and lack of a sense of community and meaning to life – that works best, at tackling (and reducing) crime. Furthermore, the successful 'broken windows' theory of containing and reducing crime has shown that improving the character of the urban environment can itself play a very significant role. When the environment is kept in a good condition, then potential criminals get the message that criminality and anti-social-behaviour is not desirable and is not tolerated.
Thus the number one priority for the Green Party, in preventing crime, is to tackle its causes. We look at crime always as part of a whole picture, of how well our society, and our local community, is functioning.
We would tackle (the causes of) crime:
- By fostering full employment (for example, Green policy favours supporting small local businesses. We back the 'Buy Local' campaign. We oppose the expansion of supermarkets, which have been proven to leach jobs out of local areas.)
- By fostering a robust sense of community; natural surveillance (people being able to see what's going on - i.e. living in the area!) and strong local communities are far more sustainable solutions to crime problems than Council-Tax-heavy 'solutions' such as huge, little-used and ineffective CCTV systems with images that can’t even be made out. CCTV should be used selectively, where it actually works, at an affordable cost; however, the default position for Greens is that anything a machine can do, a bunch of thoughtful and watchful humans can do better… Neighbourhood Watching, and communities that effectively self-police, such as co-housing communities (see 'promoting better physical design', below), are an important part of the answer here.
- By fostering strong networks of local people (neighbours, those in uniform, all of us) who are the best preventers of crime, by being each others' eyes and ears. Our key policy proposal here is to have more (and not, as the other Parties almost invariably suggest, in counter-productive 'cost-cutting' exercises, fewer) park-keepers, bus-conductors, railway-officials, etc – basically, desirable agents of 'social control' (without turning the place into a 'police state')
- By preserving green spaces, as Greens have actively and successfully done in for instance the Hewett School site, in the Lakenham / Town Close area. How can we hope to prevent people from drifting into a life of crime if there is nothing to love in the area they live in? A healthy population, getting plenty of exercise and living with some sense of interconnectedness with nature, is good for keeping crime down. That is a fact. (In this connection, Greens also back a Community Gardens Scheme for Norwich, as proposed by the incoming Labour administration at City Hall.)
- By giving our young people more enjoyable things to do (e.g. Greens propose to bring in a skate park for the center of Norwich, and to start up teamsports (e.g. football teams) in places across the city where they are needed.) We want to ensure universal access to high quality youth facilities and open spaces. Because it is common-sense that this is how to tackle crime at one of its roots, long-term. And, regrettably: other Parties seem to be cutting these services to reduce council taxes. The Green argument against this would be that if you want a good quality of life you need shorter term AND long term policies.
We would further act to prevent crime, in the short term by:
- Prioritising the prevention and rapid repair of vandalism, so as to preserve a high quality urban environment. Green Councillors prioritise this in their 'casework'.
- Acting to reduce the likelihood of alcohol-related crime; Greens will call for a review of the late licenses that the City has granted, at the earliest opportunity provided by law, in all cases where there is any evidence of the licenses leading to crime or disorder. (If necessary, we will call for 'zoning' to remove late licenses altogether from areas where anti-social behaviour is resulting from a proliferation of boozing late into the night.)
- Providing more Community Support Officers (CSOs) The team of Green Councillors now has regular scheduled meetings with local police officers to discuss matters of concern (e.g. patterns of anti-social behaviour) that have been raised by residents on the doorstep. We are experienced in dealing with crime and anti-social behaviour. We would like to strengthen the police's ability to work on such matters in the following way: Local Councils can 'purchase' extra CSOs at very affordable rates. Green Councillors have plenty of experience now of working effectively with CSOs in their wards (e.g. in Wensum); we want to see more CSOs in Norwich, acting in close touch with wardens and the local community.
- Lobbying the police to travel on foot and on bikes more, not in cars. Policemen and policewomen on the beat accessibly, rather than just zipping by in a metal box and moving on, are more effective at helping the community to feel safer. We want to see a substantial permanent bike-based police unit in Norwich. Bike-based police units, which have been introduced with a high level of success in London, as a result of lobbying by Green London Assembly Members, should be 'rolled out' to other urban centers. These police, and (to a lesser extent) all police, should work to ensure that bike paths and pavements are safe places to be; and should target those motorists (and sometimes cyclists too!) who, by driving at high speed, or on surfaces where they are not allowed to drive, risk becoming criminals through speeding, dangerous driving, or manslaughter, etc. These are ways in which transport is a crime-and-community-safety issue, and crime is an issue which crucially impacts sustainable transport.
- Lobbying police to concentrate on prevention - not just detection to hit government targets. At present, the police are spending far too much time chasing cases that they will never solve, to try to hit government targets for 'clear-up rates'. Police action to prevent crime, rather than just endless often-entirely-unsuccessful attempts to solve crimes, tends to be a more effective use of police time. The scientific criminological evidence strongly suggests that it is the fear of being detected in the act that most strongly deters potential criminals – not fear of being caught later, still less fear of being punished. We want to help the police to make Norwich a safer place – through preventing crime.
- Promoting better physical design making streets safer and buildings more difficult to break in to: Greens will use planning policy to help prevent crime, in this way. There is evidence that design in new build can affect behaviour and reduce the incidence of crime. Purpose designed co-housing schemes have done this to good effect, where design has enhanced social interaction and cohesion and consequently greatly reduced the possibility of crime, especially to individuals. We will actively promote such schemes through the Council.
- Arguing in favour of the rehabilitation of offenders. Norwich Green Councillors are concerned that our prisons are not preparing prisoners effectively for life outside prison walls. Many of those currently in Norwich Prison will settle in the Norwich area when they leave prison. Former prisoners cannot be ignored; they are part of the community.
Former prisoners need help with family commitments, finding work and engaging in voluntary activities that enable them to make a positive contribution to the community.
Greens will monitor conditions inside Norwich Prison, to ensure that prisoners are treated humanely and are being actively rehabilitated - recognising that successful rehabilitation is the best way to reduce offending.
- Using the wardens to prevent crime effectively. The neighbourhood-based City-run warden teams, that have operated in parts of Norwich for several years now, are demonstrably effective, and the Green Party has consistently called for, voted for and put money into these teams. There is a key enabling role for the wardens in cycle proficiency schemes, 'graffiti walls', sports coaching, and keeping a watchful eye on vulnerable people. It particularly prioritises working pro-actively to protect the old and the young.
Finally, there is action on Enforcement to consider, wherever and whenever the measures outlined above have not yet had time to be effective:
- The Council-run warden scheme of course will continue to play an important role here, especially in those areas of Norwich where, thanks to Green and Labour initiatives, the city-wide warden scheme will soon be reaching for the first time.
- Norwich Greens will promote mediation as a good value-for-money, effective, and non-bureaucratic means of dealing with neighbour disputes. An important policy proposal here is: We will ensure that Council space is given to two Norwich-based groups we are aware of who want to offer mediation services, but are currently unable to. The use of mediation as a way of actually solving disputes without involving the law in costly ways has been far too neglected in Norwich, to date.
- Where mediation fails or is impracticable, Norwich Green Party backs Labour's plans for fast-track action, co-ordinated between Housing Services, wardens and police, to stop neighbours who are behaving unpleasantly or anti-socially.
Nationally, Green MPs would:
- Push for tough new legislation on gun and knife crime, reducing the availability of these weapons;
- Introduce 'restorative' and 'reparative' justice schemes (ie criminals undertake some 'payback' to victims – this is good value for money, and it works); and would
- Promote human rights and tackle hate crime more robustly.
- Move the Probation Service toward rehabilitation and a 'social work' role, and away from mere punishment. The Probation Service needs to be more humane, in order to be more effective.
Summary
For Greens, crime and community safety is inseparable from economic policy, and from environmental policy, and from health policy, and from education policy. A wholistic Green vision is needed if we in Norwich and in Britain are to have a serious and effective set of crime and community safety policies. We don’t need more materialism, or more big corporations, or more ugly new building, to provide an enhanced level of community well-being, in the greater Norwich area; we need a strengthened level of community-feeling and community-spirit; we need measures to build a sense of collective responsibility and human decency; we need education that creates good caring citizens rather than would-be criminals;
We need crime-prevention...
And (only if all these fail) we need proper and effective enforcement of the law.
Our vision is one in which community safety and individual well-being is the driving force behind crime policy. There is much that the Council can do to foster such well-being, and thus achieve the goal of a safer community – provided that the citizenry work with politicians and officials to achieve this.
Ask what your Council can do for you – and ask what you can do to achieve a safer, more peaceful community. |