Wiltshire Police Authority

Public Confidence in Wiltshire Police and Local Authorities

The Government set a demanding target on police services to increase to 60% by 2012 the proportion of people who are confident that the police and local council are dealing with anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter locally. This is now the only numerical target set for forces and monitored directly by the Home Office using the British Crime Survey (BCS) which this year reported a result of 46.6% confidence for Wiltshire against this measure.

However, to give a better picture of public confidence at a local level all forces and police authorities have been working to provide data on this indicator at Community Safety Partnership (CSP) level through their own local surveys which are considered by the Home Office alongside the BCS result.

The following shows 2009/10 results from local consultation carried out by Wiltshire Police Authority [WPA] which also reports confidence at CSP levels for Swindon and Wiltshire. WPA notes a higher confidence result in our local survey of 69% at force level in comparison to BCS findings, also reflected in both CSP results (see below).

Local Confidence Results 2009/10

* Wiltshire target set in 2009/10 according to local baseline results in 2008/09.

WPA will monitor its local results and differences with the BCS, which in line with BCS methodology will also be conducted on a quarterly basis from April 2010 and published on our website.

Click here to view full details of our consultation this year and actions we are taking to address your priorities in 2010/11.

Survey Summary

A low crime rate and feeling safe in the local area are the top two factors residents in both Swindon and Wiltshire think are most important in making somewhere a good place to live.

Our results showed that around one in ten respondents feel crime and anti-social behaviour has increased in their local area over the last 12 months, and when asked specifically which crime and anti-social behaviour issues were a problem in their neighbourhood; traffic offences and young people hanging around appear to be the biggest problems. However, approximately two in five respondents actually responded to say there were no crime or anti social behaviour issues in their local area.

* Our survey is based on a random survey of people in the local area and represents 1,500 in this year. The use of a random sample aims to ensure the results are statistically representative of the local population. Compared to other estimates of how the population is made up, the sample for this survey may under represent some subgroups.