Benefits officers enlisted to tackle anti-social behaviour

Officials from housing benefits officers to TV licence inspectors are to be enlisted in the fight against anti-social behaviour, under plans unveiled today by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith.

In a keynote speech in London, Ms Smith called for "better joined up working" by the police, local councils and other statutory authorities to expose the wider criminal activities of the most persistent offenders.

She said the small core of troublemakers who cause the most problems would face checks for benefit and council tax fraud, television licence evasion and vehicle insurance dodging.

"People shouldn't have to put up with anti-social behaviour. We have put in place the teams, the powers and the know-how so that every community benefits from effective action that works," she said.

"The Government is firmly on the side of communities where people have had enough and there will be no escape for persistent offenders.

"If you can't behave properly it won't just be the police watching you, but local councils, housing benefit officers, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency and the TV Licensing authority."

Ms Smith pointed to Essex Police's Operation Leopard, which had a 100 per cent success rate in tackling repeat offenders, as an example of what could be achieved.

Operation Leopard involved daily police visits to troublemakers, with repeated warnings and persistent filming of offenders and their associates, in order to create an environment where there was "nowhere to hide".

Ms Smith said the Home Office was creating a new Action Squad, with funding of £255,000, to help police and local agencies to make full use of the powers available to them.

The Home Secretary also stressed the importance of early intervention to tackle the first signs of problem behaviour before it gets to the stage where more serious measures, such as Asbos, were required.

She said that there had been a sharp in increase in England and Wales in the use of anti-social behaviour interventions, such as parenting orders and acceptable behaviour contracts, which had risen from 7,444 in 2003/04 to 26,675 last year.

At the same time, the number of Asbos being issued had fallen from a peak in 2005 of 4,123 to 2,706 last year.

Ms Smith said the courts would now be required to consider making a parent order when issuing Asbos to 10-17 year-olds.

"The figures I have published today are further evidence of the progress we have made," she said.

"Where tough enforcement is needed it is happening, but we are getting in there early, nipping problems in the bud and putting a stop to them before they get of out control."