Crime Reduction Initiatives - Assignment Example

 Crime Reduction Initiatives This discussion will examine in what ways the Morgan Report has influenced a change in the direction of criminal law enforcement. This 1991 report has lead to the extensive modification of not only public opinion but to progressive legislative initiatives that have attempted to address crime reduction more effectively. To understand the connection of the report to governmental response, a brief history of crime reduction efforts leading up to this report and how they built upon each other must be overviewed. An explanation of the Morgan Report will demonstrate how communities throughout the UK are combating the increase of crime by utilizing its teachings. Four distinctive areas will be referenced as examples of their implementation in principles laid down by the Morgan Report. This Report has influenced subsequent legislation such as the Crime and Disorders Act of 1998 which has impacted substantially the very philosophy of crime reduction. This Act, a descendent of the Morgan Report, will also be reviewed. There were 181 police forces in Britain, operating mostly independently of each other, at the beginning of the twentieth century. These small enforcement groups had limited collaboration or communications between them. 43 police forces function within England and Wales today supplied with many more police officers. Interactivity between these units has increased significantly over the years with the advent of new technologies and the need to slow criminal activity, not just in a region but nation-wide. Despite new technologies that aided police in performing their duties more competently, crime continued to become increasingly prevalent after 1960, which predictably led to public condemnation of the police. It had become apparent that traditional policing methods would not prevent or reduce crime on their own. Police organisations began seeking the involvement the community. This move was a change from a predominately reactive style of enforcement. “In the early 1980s, alongside changes in policing, the government of the day put crime prevention firmly on the agenda with a number of circulars proposing coordinated approaches to crime prevention, involving many organisations working together” (“What is Crime Reduction” 2006). In 1984, an inter-departmental circular suggested the establishment of local multi-group assemblies to undertake crime issues. Historic milestones involving recent expansive techniques of crime prevention and community safety can be traced to this circular, which had built upon earlier ideas of criminal reduction developments. “The circular affirmed: ‘A primary objective of the police has always been the prevention of crime. However, since some of the factors affecting crime lie outside the control or direct influence of the police, crime prevention can not be left to them alone. Every individual citizen and all those agencies whose policies and practices can influence the extent of crime should make their contribution. Preventing crime is a task for the whole community” (Crawford 1998). However, Government strategies while articulate and logical regarding the principle of partnerships, were consistently and considerably vague as to the proper allocation of particular partnership responsibilities. Little direction or guidance was forthcoming defining leadership or the distribution of roles. “The question of leadership remained a controversial issue, one which the Home Office sought to avoid by suggesting that the notion of identifying a single lead agency was anachronistic to a genuine partnership approach” (Crawford & Matassa 2000 pp. 55-56). Despite much rhetoric about the issue of effective collaboration between agencies, in reality leadership responsibilities are falling back onto the police. By the late 1980’s, several Government initiatives were instituted to encourage the archetype of crime prevention methodology which was emerging. In 1986, the Five Towns Initiative was implemented. It served as a precursor for the more wide-ranging Safer Cities Programme, launched in 1988 “to tackle crime in the inner cities through proactive, multi-agency projects in areas with particular crime problems, drawing on the problem solving approach” (“What is Crime Reduction” 2006 p. 4). This became the central focus as the standard through which the government’s crime prevention message was to be delivered. Also in 1988, Parliament developed Crime Concern to concentrate on private sector involvement in the reduction of crime. “The Home Office returned to, and reinforced, the message spelt out in circular 8/1984 by issuing a follow-up circular 44/1990 entitled Crime Prevention – The Success of the Partnership Approach” (Crawford & Matassa 2000 pp. 55-56). The circular was accompanied by a Home Office compiled ‘good practice booklet’ (Home Office 1990). It proposed that there are “necessary elements: structure, leadership, information, identity, durability and resources” (Crawford & Matassa 2000 pp. 55-56) for a crime prevention project to be successful. “The Home Office then gave the responsibility for reviewing the development of crime prevention to the Standing Conference on Crime Prevention chaired by James Morgan (Morgan 1991). “The Morgan Report represented a significant stage in the elaboration of ‘community safety,’ a term which it preferred to ‘crime prevention’ as a distinct policy arena, advocating specific institutional structures” (Morgan 1991). The Report, (Safer Communities: the ‘Local Delivery of Crime Prevention through the Partnership Approach’ Home Office Standing Conference on Crime Prevention. August 1991) “introduced the concept of ‘community safety’ and emphasized that crime reduction should be ‘holistic’ covering both situational and social approaches” (Davington 2006). It identified a three-tiered structure of responsibility centrally controlled involving local strategy and action groups, independent committees and the local police authorities. “The Report also recommended additional funding from central Government to support the proposed new duty on local authorities. However, the Government of the day rejected the Report’s principal recommendations” (Crawford & Matassa 2000 pp. 55-56). The Report recommended that local authorities should be given ‘statutory’ or overall responsibility for coordinating police departments guiding them in the development and motivation of community safety and crime prevention groups. The Report further identified techniques that would help communities band together as a whole, top to bottom in their collective crime reduction interests such as: A coordinator with administrative support should be appointed to the local authority structure with particular attention being given to issues of young people and crime in local partnerships. “Chief constables should nominate for each local authority area the most senior local operational officer in order to promote coterminous boundaries, particular attention should be given to making the ‘best use of the resource represented by voluntary effort.’” (Morgan 1991). The Report concluded that additional consideration should be focused on involving business as a partner of the state in reducing crime instead of simply regarding it exclusively as a potential source of revenue. “The government should examine how far the strong focus needed at the centre can be provided by strengthening existing organisations or creating new ones and to develop a clear statement of crime prevention training needs and an action plan to meet those needs and provide a community safety impact statement for all new legislation and major policy initiatives” (Morgan 1991). In summation, this report recommended that “local authorities, working in conjunction with the police, should have a clear statutory responsibility for the development of community safety and crime prevention programmes” (“What is Crime Reduction?” 2006). “Community safety is a term which achieved prominence after the 1991 Morgan Report” (“Community Safety” 2006). However, Parliament did not implement these recommendations until 1998 when the Crime and Disorder Act received Royal Assent in July of that year. Giving the Morgan Report lawful foundations, this Act laid the ground for Statutory Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships (CDRPs). “It gave the lead responsibility for crime and disorder reduction to the police and local authorities, requiring them to produce audits and strategies to plan for this. A new duty on police and local authorities required them to consider crime and disorder in all their activities” (“What is Crime Reduction?” 2006). The Labour Party dedicated itself to progressing suggestions originating from the Morgan Report and formally implemented many of its recommendations resulting in the The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 (CDA). “The national impetus for greater coordination and development of crime prevention and community safety stagnated under the previous Conservative administration, in part due to their ideological dislike of the Morgan Report’s central recommendations, which the Government itself had set up” (Crawford & Matassa 2000 p. 60). Local administration organizations were influential in building this issue into political leverage by calling for the statutory implementation of Morgan report fundamentals during the1997 election campaign. Since inception, the CDA has significantly revived community interest and involvement in crime reduction (Crawford & Matassa 2000 p. 60). The CDA gives authority to disclose information for the purposes of the Act (s. 115). This is intended to facilitate a smoother, more efficient process regarding the exchange of information between police and governmental agencies, a central concept in the Act’s partnership methodology. When exercising their various functions, local authorities are to consider the CDA implications and the prerequisites involved in doing all that they reasonably can to reduce crime in that area.(s. 17). “An anti-social behavior order which will provide a civil remedy, for senior police officers and/or chief executives of a council (s. 1). Local authorities will have the power to order a curfew for youths under 10 years of age in a specific area following consultation with the police and local community (ss. 14-15). A proposed child safety order will be available on application by the local authority to the civil court (ss. 11-12)” (Crawford 1998 p. 61). A principle aim of the legislation is crime reduction by offending youths by moving responsibility of a child’s actions more toward the parents (s. 37). The Act authorizes the courts to formulate a ‘parenting order’ on the parent of a young offender. A child is subject to a ‘child safety order’ if they, for example, are not attending school regularly (ss. 10-12). “Local authorities are required to establish one or more multi-disciplinary ‘youth offending teams’ to bring together ‘the experience and skills of relevant local agencies to address the causes of a young person’s offending and so reduce the risk of re-offending’ and to encourage children and young persons not to commit offences (s. 39)” (Crawford 1998 p. 61). Following the Morgan Report but preceding the 1998 Act, many communities voluntarily and enthusiastically adopted much if its precepts. In 1993, “the Hampshire County Council discussed with representatives of District Councils how the partnership might be developed. Those discussions led to the County Council adopting a policy statement committing each county agency to support and engage in the work of District Groups when invited” (Hampshire City Council 1993). Many communities began implementation of the Morgan Report before the CDA was passed and are still adamant about its realizations. The Newcastle Community Safety Strategy Partnership outlined in 2002 its plan to create a safer community by working with partners and communities to identify and implement local solutions to local community safety concerns. Outlined in their strategy, their ‘vision’ for this effort, is a quote from the Morgan Report. “People, communities and organisations, including families, victims and risk groups as well as attempting to reduce particular types of crime and the fear of crime” (Thomas 2002). Formed in 1999, The Community Safety Partnership in Newcastle comprises people from the public, private and legal sectors. Some communities, such as South Somerset, began its implementation of the Morgan Report principles just before the 1998 CDA. The South Somerset District Council made formal a lengthy dissertation of sweeping reforms to reduce crime in February, 1998. In this declaration, it too in its adopted policy quoted the Report. “We see Community Safety as having both social and situational aspects, as being concerned with people, communities and organisations, including families, victims and at risk groups, as well as attempting to reduce particular types of crime and the fear of crime. Community Safety should be seen as the legitimate concern of all in the local community” (Nesbitt 1998). The 2004 Isle of Anglesey Crime and Disorder Audit recognized the Morgan Report as a catalyst in this new method of reducing crime in its findings. The Report “outlined that the way forward in combating and reducing crime is by a partnership approach by all members of the community. The task of reducing crime and disorder can no longer be left solely to the Police and that other agencies must play a key part in the process,” (Isle of Anglesey City Council 2004) the City Council said within the audit analysis. Not all communities began instituting principles of the Morgan Report at the same time nor have they experienced similar results. Those that have started slowly or have not achieved desired results as yet are still invigorated by its concepts and continue to initiate or improve on it and the CDA ideals for crime reduction. “In Bristol, where the Crime and Disorder Partnership (CDRP) was particularly weak in its early years, there has been a revival. The Chief Constable of Avon and Somerset, Steve Pilkington, chaired a special leadership group to run the initiative. He pulled together the same agencies who were failing to work together in the CDRP and gave them a chance to succeed. That has now had a knock-on effect on the CDRP, which is finally showing signs of life” (Davies 2003). The Morgan Report has been instrumental in not only defining a concrete strategy for legislative direction; it has served to reform public opinion regarding crime reduction. Parliament action has matched public sentiment and both are energized by its simple precepts of total community involvement. Instead of playing the blame game, everyone is encouraged to get involved in the safety of their communities. Many of these communities took action well before the government by setting its own cooperative policies modeled by the Morgan Report. For the first time, there seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel in what was quite rightly perceived as a losing battle on crime. What was becoming generally supposed as a fact of life, the increase in crime is now seen as a winnable mission if the entire community works together. Thanks to the Morgan Report, the new fact of life, as many communities view it, is that reduction of crime is an attainable goal. The local authorities of many communities have been well ahead in implementing initiatives suggested by the Report to ensure it. References “Community Safety.” (February 17 2006). Community Safety Advisory Service. Retrieved March 3 2006 from Crawford, Adam. (December 3 1998). “Implementing Crime and Disorder Strategies.” Crime and Disorder Act 1998 [paper presented to conference]. University of Leicester, Scarman Centre. Retrieved March 3 2006 from Crawford, Adam & Matassa, Mario. (2000). “Community Safety Structures: An International Literature Review.” Criminal Justice Review Group. Retrieved March 3 2006 from Davies, Nick. (July 12 2003). “Using New Tools to Attack the Roots of Crime.” The Guardian Unlimited. Retrieved March 3 2006 from Davington. (2006). “Partnership Development.” Davington Center for Community Solutions. Retrieved March 3 2006 from < http://www.communitysolutionscentre.co.uk/ourexperience_files/partnership_development.htm> Hampshire City Council. (November 16 1993). “Police Authority.” Hantsweb. Retrieved March 3 2006 from < http://www.hants.gov.uk/scrmxn/c16562.html> Isle of Anglesey City Council. (January 27 2004). “The Isle of Anglesey Crime and Disorder Audit.” The Community of the Isle of Anglesey. Retrieved March 3 2006 from Morgan, J. (1991). “Safer Communities: The Local Delivery of Crime Prevention Through the Partnership Approach, Standing Conference on Crime Prevention.” London Home Office. Nesbitt, Leslie. (February 24 1998). “Community Safety Review.” South Somerset District Council. Retrieved March 3 2006 from Thomas, R. (2002). “A Safer City Community Safety Strategy 2002-2005.” Visions. Retrieved March 3 2006 from “What is Crime Reduction?” (January 2006). Passport to Crime Reduction. Retrieved March 3 2006 from Read More