2:08pm Wednesday 15th October 2008
By Claire Hack
GIVE us more cash to tackle violent youth crime – that is the plea to the Government from Waltham Forest’s top police officer.
Despite the borough having the ninth highest rate of robbery in England and Wales, with many of the perpetrators and victims aged 16 to 20, it has this year been denied a slice of a proposed £57million fund to tackle violent street culture.
Frustrated at being overlooked, borough commander Chief Supt Mark Benbow is to try and persuade the Government that the borough’s police need the money.
Speaking at a meeting of the council’s scrutiny committees, Chief Supt Benbow said: “We are still fifth highest in London for youth crime.
“We did not get the £700,000 from the Youth Crime Action Plan and that’s a real disappointment – we’re trying to challenge the government on that.”
Waltham Forest is one of six boroughs identified by the Met as being of most concern regarding serious youth violence and knife crime.
Cabinet member for community safety Cllr Afzal Akram added: “We’ve got all the problems of an inner London borough – exceptions should be made where exceptions are required.
“We’ve also written to the Home Office and it has agreed to meet with a delegation of officers to find out why we should get some of that money.”
He stated that the council has also written to Mayor of London Boris Johnson to ask him to look again at the formula used to decide how much funding is allocated in London.
At the meeting of the scrutiny committees, young people were given the chance to express their views.
A representative group from the Youth Independent Advisory Group (YIAG), who declined to be named, told of how they feel attacked by the media and how police do not show them enough respect.
One young woman said: “A lot of the guys I used to hang around with have been defined as being in gangs and that defines me as being in a gang – but I’m not.
“When I look at them, I see them as my brothers but everyone’s saying ‘they’re in a gang, they’re bad’.”
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