Funding to help keep streets safe
The Police and Crime Commissioner for the Thames Valley has successfully bid for £401,950 from the Home Office to help make communities safer.
The Government has today [Thursday 3rd June] announced Thames Valley as one of 40 areas across England and Wales who will receive funding from the £18 million Safer Streets Fund.
Matthew Barber, Police and Crime Commissioner for the Thames Valley, said: “I am delighted to have secured funding of more than £400,000 from the Safer Streets Fund. This funding will be used to tackle crime such as burglary, robbery and vehicle theft in Reading.
“We will be working closely with Reading Borough Council and Thames Valley Police to ensure this funding goes directly to tackling neighbourhood crime and making our communities safer. As part of our bid, we will be looking at many areas of improvement such as providing crime prevention packs to landlords to make their properties more secure, training for frontline officers in crime prevention awareness and the installation of additional CCTV in areas of concern.
“We will also be working with the local community to engage them with crime prevention through advice and education.
“This is the second successful bid we’ve made from Thames Valley to the Safer Streets Fund and the next bidding round opens today.
“I look forward to seeing positive outcomes for our communities and I hope that we can spread the benefits and learning from these projects across Thames Valley.”
Home Secretary Priti Patel said: “I will not stand by while criminals inflict fear and misery on our communities, which is why I launched the Safer Streets Fund to improve security in areas blighted by crimes like burglary, robbery and theft.
“But it’s more than just environmental change – we need to prevent people from committing these offences in the first place as we build back safer.
“That is why the next round will rightly look at behaviour change, with a primary focus on women and girls who are disproportionately affected by crimes like harassment in public places.”
The Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley has received £401,950 which will focus on Reading, specifically the Coley and Oxford Road areas of the town. This work will feed into a bigger project which will evaluate crime reduction as a result of these bids and what investments can be made across the rest of Thames Valley.
