The campaign to stamp out hate-crime across the borough was boosted this month with the appointment of a special officer.

Rasheeda Ali-Selvaratnam has been appointed as hate-crime co-ordinator in Enfield Council's community safety team.

Hate-crime is characterised by violent and intimidating behaviour directed at people on the grounds of their race, sexual orientation or domestic violence.

The former barrister's role is to promote greater awareness of hate-crime and to ensure the multi-agency network provides a clear response to it.

Ms Ali-Selvaratnam said: "I want to establish a unified approach to this work in the borough so victims of these crimes have the confidence to come forward and report them."

She added that victims needed to feel secure when reporting hate-crime and needed to be aware of the range of support services available to them.

She also plans to strengthen links with council services, police, Enfield's Racial Equality Council, residents associations, the Racial Incidents Action Group, Victim Support, Enfield Domestic Violence Forum and other key partners.

Borough Commander Simon O'Brien has welcomed Rasheeda's appointment.

He said: "We want victims to take that vital step in coming forward to report these crimes and we want them to feel confident they can make their reports to any of the community groups in our multi-agency network."

He said he wanted to continue to build strong links in the community and create new ones with the help of Ms Ali-Selvaratnam.

Cllr Irene Richards, chairwoman of the domestic violence forum said hate-crime is often not recorded because it is not reported. She said: "This is especially true of domestic violence where victims can be too fearful to come forward."

"This new appointment will help us in our efforts to support victims and help us to encourage more victims to speak out."

Anyone wishing to report hate-crime can call Ms Ali-Selvaratnam on 8379 3138 or for racial incidents call Kaunchita Maudhub on 8379 4182.