A proud history stretching back to 1839 – but the context is changing
Over the last ten years, policing has changed considerably, not just because of our financial situation but because the nature of crime itself has changed. You will probably now be familiar with phrases like county lines, organised crime gangs (OCGs), child sexual exploitation, modern day slavery and trafficking, cyber- crime, crypto currency, the dark web and sextortion. You may also have seen media headlines highlighting increased reports of domestic abuse, stalking
and we campaign hard to raise awareness of what you can do to protect yourself and others from harm. Although crime rates in Gloucestershire are low compared to most other similar forces, we still deal with around 160,000 incidents annually, with high demand around violent crime, theft and sexual offences. That’s around four crimes every hour. In addition, all of our senior officers hold national and regional roles as we work together on cross cutting and complex issues that affect us all.
and harassment, knife crime and acid attacks. Whilst I am pleased to say that our county is not as badly affected by some of these crime types as others, when it is combined with the enduring security threat, levels of mental health issues and number of vulnerable people in society, these changes have placed significant demand on us. We aim to ideally prevent such events or investigate them and in recent years a huge amount of unseen police activity and intelligence work has resulted in more than 200 years of custodial sentences for the offenders of these very serious crimes committed in Gloucestershire. What we may think of as traditional forms of crime like burglary and theft haven't of course gone away, but the even more sinister crimes have changed the way all police forces operate. Prevention is key to much of our work and we are an example of best practice for other forces in some of that work, particularly in the way we tackle vulnerability, violent crime and hate crime. In addition, every day our schoolbeat officers are working with young people, our roads policing team are addressing road safety issues, our officers are finding and bringing a considerable number of missing people to safety
Neighbourhood policing is an integral part of our work and at the beginning of 2018 we re-introduced neighbourhood policing teams who focus on community engagement and long-term problem solving. You can find out who your local policing team is and what the local issues are in your area by visiting our website at www.gloucestershire.police.uk/ neighbourhood-policing or by signing up for our free community alert service (Your Community Alerts) where you will receive regular updates relevant to where you live. As the second oldest rural police force in the country, we are a very different organisation to the one formed in 1839. We are proud that our recent Home Office inspection rated us ‘good’ in almost all areas and recognises the considerable progress we have made. We are not complacent though and know we have more to do. We are committed to continuing our improvement journey for the benefit of the people of Gloucestershire l By Gloucestershire’s Chief Constable Rod Hansen
September 2019 | www. punchline-gloucester .com | 75
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