LeicestershireNeighbourhood Watch Association 2012 AGM

Minutes of the AGM held on Friday 22 June 2012

Leicestershire Police HQ, St Johns, Enderby, Leics.

  1. Welcome and Introductions

Cllr Bill Wright, chair of Leicestershire Neighbourhood Watch Association, welcomed everyone to the meeting and thanked them for attending and welcomed our special guests, Baroness Byford, the Chief Constable Simon Cole and Kate Daisley of the Neighbourhood and Home Watch Network (NHWN).

  1. Apologies

The list of apologies was read out by Jacqui Noon, in her role as Secretary of the Association.

23 NHW Members

Sgt Nick Everitt – Harborough LPU

Jim Maddan – Chair NHWN

Inspector Paul McKinder – Harborough LPU

David Rhodes – Chair CNNWA

Terry Shrives – Director

Graham Davies - Director

  1. Minutes of AGM held on 14th April 2011

Matters Arising

These were agreed and signed by the Trustees and the Directors. Marion Lewis said that as we are a company limited by guarantee, directors and trustees approve the minutes, so there was no requirement for approval at this meeting.

No matters arising.

  1. Chair’s Report – Bill Wright

Neighbourhood Watch, like many other organisations has had to bear the brunt during 2011 of the harsh economic climate. It is to our credit that being a truly voluntary organisation of over 30 years standing, we have not suffered from having to reduce staff like many other third sector organisations, but that does not mean that we have escaped from the effects of the fallout of other partners.

The lack of any printed literature from the Home Office and the reduction in dedicated staff to support Neighbourhood Watch directly at Force level has meant that we have had to become more reliant on technology and social media as methods of getting our messages out. Although these methods are criticised by many old school members, it has provided us with opportunities to engage with both our existing membership and the next generation of members, who we need to ensure that we succeed as an organisation for another 30 years.

The committee are dedicated to ensuring that we embrace the new technology afforded to us by the Neighbourhood & Home Watch Network (NHWN) – the Neighbourhood Alert system. We may not have as many twitter followers as some, but we can boast one of the largest memberships within the East Midlands and unlike other social media avenues, we can be assured that our messages are being emailed, texted, tweeted and voice-mailed in a targeted way to residents within our force area which will help to both reassure and support everyone and not just those who are ‘’technology savvy’.

It is to the credit of our membership that they have undertaken a somewhat lengthy process to join our Neighbourhood Alert messaging system, which involves 8 stages to complete the registration. By providing them with the options of not just how they receive messages but also the type of messages they want to receive, we can ensure that the messages we send are tailored to suit each individual’s choices.

We are committed to providing a service to our loyal membership and to future generations of members to assist them to enhance their quality of life and afford everyone the right to feel safe in their own neighbourhood

Congratulations, many of you were instrumental in starting up the initial schemes 30 years ago, and to the thousands of others who have set up schemes across Leicestershire & Rutland since.

  1. Treasurer’s Report – Marion Lewis OBE

The accounts have been prepared by an independent auditor, in accordance with the special provisions of the Companies Act 2006 relating to small companies.

The accounts show an income of £132 and expenditure of £ 874 for the year ending 31st December 2011, leaving a balance of £2228. I propose that these accounts be accepted by the Directors.

These monetary accounts do not reflect the amount of ‘in kind support’ which we receive from many of the partners that we have developed since our formation. We are fortunate to receive enormous support from Leicestershire Police in the form of office accommodation and storage in many of our local policing units. This affords us the enviable position of providing a Neighbourhood Watch service to the residents of Leicester and Leicestershire totally free of charge, a position which we will strive to maintain.

Since its formation in 2007, we have continued to receive in kind support in many ways from the national Neighbourhood & Home Watch Network (NHWN) in the form of free Public Liability Insurance for our members and free Neighbourhood Watch stickers. The availability of free places on the new BTEC Advanced Award in Community Advocacy, enabled three of our members to become amongst the first people in the country to undertake and pass this innovative qualification designed to further enhance Neighbourhood Watch’s engagement with local Community Safety Partnerships and other relevant partners.

The most significant free facility afforded to us in 2011 was the formal launch of the Neighbourhood Watch’s own independent messaging service Neighbourhood Alert. This has proven a valuable tool in enabling us to both to measure and record accurately the membership across the County but more importantly to use as a tool to have enable us a dialogue with all our members and to share best practice and crime prevention advice our neighbouring county associations and residents across the East Midlands to over 38,600 registered users.

Once again in 2011 working with many partner agencies on the Home Safety Action Group we help to produce and deliver the 2011 Doorstep calendar for those who are amongst some of our most vulnerable residents. In kind support from that group provided Neighbourhood Watch with over 8000 copies of the 2011 calendar to distribute across the force area.

Other partners who have provided us with in kind support include Trading Standards, Voluntary Action Leicester, Crimestoppers, Suzy Lamplugh Trust, Office of Fair Trading and Age UK and we look forward to working with all of our partners and developing more in 2012.

  1. Election of Trustees

Marion Lewis reported that under our terms and conditions, there is no-one up for re-election, which goes on a three year cycle. All trustees will be co-opted automatically.

We have had one person who has come forward, Susan Gater, who has just set up NHW as part of the Residents Association on the Thorpe Astley Estate, Susan was proposed by Bill Wright and seconded by Trevor Matthews. As no objections were received Susan Gater was voted onto the committee as another member from the Blaby area. Long standing representative for Braunstone Town, Trevor Matthews is retiring, and Marion said they were massive shoes to step into but she is sure Trevor will give Susan lots of support.

  1. Kate Daisley – Operations Director – Neighbourhood and Home Watch Network

Mr Maddan, National Chair of Neighbourhood and Home Watch Network was taken seriously ill a few weeks ago, so Kate Daisley offered his apologies and presented on the network’s plans for the next 12 months.

Kate said that as the old national scheme imploded it became clear there was still a need for the Network. The membershipasked for a support network which wasn’t top heavy and to whom they could turn to for support, guidance and best practice. Kate said that the Home Office had been investigating capacity building, and there was £0.5m available to develop an infrastructure. Police forces and NHW joined together to develop a forum to elect a NHW rep who can then attend national meetings in an advisory capacity. Marion Lewis was the first elected chair for the network up until November 2010 when she stepped down to take on other community projects.

Kate said that they have recruited a small team to deliver their ambitious five year plan, with a small office in Beaumont Leys. As most senior staff member, Kate has managed to retain all the original staff and recruit an apprentice, with the recruitment of a service manager forthcoming. Accommodation costs are very reasonable at £2,200 per year with overheads and core costs kept to a minimum level.

Funding for year two has been very challenging with the message at one point being that the network didn’t fit in the new government plan and there would be no more money. However, a meeting was secured with the Minister who was a keen supporter of the Association but didn’t see the value of a national support network. Nevertheless negotiation led to funding being secured of £170k in 2010/11. With two changes in Ministers since then, the current Minister Lord Henley, a keen supporter, secured funding for this year is £290k.

Kate then said she wished to spend a few minutes talking about the achievements that led to an increase in funding and how they are planning to spend it.

The conditions of the Home Office grant were to diversify funding and become an independent, sustainable organisation. The change in government means that charities are forced to become more business focused, which may mean the weak ones will disappear. Hence, other funding has been applied for through trusts such as Tesco. Kate said that they had also secured sponsorship from Towergate Insurance, one of the largest insurance companies in Europe. This is a three year deal for sponsorship of NHW window stickers showing their logo and contact number on the reverse, which will help them to raise their profile instead of usual marketing methods. This enables the Network to produce stickers, without this funding, and government funding disappearing there would be no stickers at all. Sponsorship has been secured from ADT who have sponsored the newsletter. Kate said that all these things cost money to produce and time to develop and circulate. Through sponsorship such as this, the Network has more money available to put back into other projects.

During her time as national chair, Marion Lewis identified a company where we could develop our own qualification at no cost to ourselves. Funding from the Home Office was secured for bursary places for 40 people across England and Wales who are now qualified community advocates.

Kate said that the network has asked members what they wanted, which was better communication not only internally but with the public and with partners, regarding the sharing of good practice and key information. This has been achieved. Young people under 40 were interested in finding out what was going on and wanted to become involved but didn’t want to be attending monthly meetings in cold village halls. The network has identified a solution. Members also said that as committee members get older and in ill health, schemes may fold. Kate said that this is being looked into.

New tools and resources have been developed to provide solutions for problems identified, including new branding to bring the image up to date. The new website has additional functionality, including a post code tool, which enables people to join and contact co-ordinators with a couple of clicks. This is the most popular tool, attracting 17,000 visitors a month.

There was no national database of schemes which was identified as a need. Kate said that they worked with a company in Nottingham to identify a solution. Along with other organisations such as Trading Standards, Fire and Rescue, we could all pool into the same database. Kate showed a map of the national picture of the database showing registered users. There are currently over 100,000 people in the database and groups such as Business Watch, Farm Watch etc. The database will grow massively to become a boundary-less database. Using this database will enable relevant messages to go out to the community, across all major national issues.

Kate reported that NHWN has recently taken ownership of Neighbourhood Return. Working with psychiatrist Dr Rupert McShane, this involves the tracking of those with dementia when they go missing. The concept is to have thousands of volunteers to help with the safe return of patients. 80% of patients are found within 2 hours. A pilot is taking place in Oxfordshire and the project won’t go live until snags have been identified and dealt with, when it is hoped that it will be rolled out nationally. This is being financed through lottery funding, with £190k for 15 months.

Kate said she was sure everyone was aware that it was Neighbourhood Watch Week, celebrating 30 years and how much volunteers have contributed to crime prevention by giving their own time freely. It amounts to £26.5bn which is thought to be a conservative estimate. Kate said it was important to carry on forging relationships with partners and to ensure professionals are aware of the size and value of the movement.

Moving on from this, Kate said it was important to raise the profile of NHW in the national press. Coverage has been obtained promoting the Neighbourhood Return project. It is important to make improvements to exposures over the next 12 months.

Kate said that the Home Office still own the NHW trademark although they have discharged responsibility. At present it is unclear what the trademark licence means to us all on street level and regarding our commercial relationship with the private sector.

Kate reported that they are currently working with other organisations to facilitate membership of young people from Muslim communities.

As a closing comment, Kate wished to say a massive thank you to all involved in NHW and for the time and effort invested in keeping neighbourhoods safe.

Marion Lewis said she had sent out a press release regarding Neighbourhood Return on Wednesday and already to the credit of Leicestershire, people have put their hands up to say that they would like to volunteer. All links will be made available on the website. She also added that if anyone is not yet registered on Ourwatch, please fill in the forms left on the tables tonight and give to Marion, or register at

  1. Simon Cole – Chief Constable

Chief Constable Simon Cole presented on where Leicestershire are as a Police force.

To summarise they have a revenue of £168million, with £15m taken out of the budget for the last two years and £8m this year.

  • 2,129 police officers (9% fewer than two years ago)
  • The same number of PCSOs are in place, with funding for PCSOs ring fenced until March of next year.
  • 1,100 staff
  • 275 specials
  • 177 volunteers (think it is more likely to be around 500)
  • Over 3,000 NHW schemes policing the best part of 1 million people
  • 20,000 arrests
  • 16,518 crimes properly detected (ie, enter the criminal justice system)
  • 25% detection rate
  • Another 3,000 crimes dealt with by restorative justice.
  • Current detection rate for this year 28.7%
  • Disparate policing area from Braunstone to Houghton on the Hill

Simon said that the force is about:

  • Protecting vulnerable people.
  • Dealing with those who cause harm
  • Effectively deploying our people.
  • Working with partners such as NHW
  • Trusting people to use judgment to make decisions.
  • Ensuring effective and efficient use of resources.

Examples of work:

  • Protection of vulnerable people – such as mental health issues, missing people and calls relating to public safety
  • Nightime economy – foot patrols, team videos and Twitter feeds
  • Security alerts – for example, the suspicious package at East Midlands Airport in October 2010.
  • Public Order – such as in the case of recent EDL visit, costing £700k
  • Queens visit to Leicester.

A typical day in Leicestershire

  • 187 crimes
  • 12 burglaries
  • 2 robberies
  • 79 incidents of anti-social behaviour
  • 55 arrests
  • 40 detections
  • 300 approx. assaults on officers last year

Mr Cole said that NHW teams are very important in what the force are doing, and they are looking at what needs be done in context of the available budget. NHW is a key partner and policing is all about working together as communities to make the world a better place.

Simon then went on to talk about the election of the Police and Crime Commissioner, Simon said that although not perfect, they will find a professional and well organised, efficient police force which is good value compared to other forces. It will be interesting to see how the successful candidate draws together all the partnership schemes, offender management etc.

The National Farmers Union have put together briefing for PCC candidates, with a message to people on Twitter saying people should not forget to vote.

Simon finished by saying that NHW is regarded as very much part of the force team. Most people in Leicestershire and Rutland want to live in a nice place that feels safe and NHW have taken a step beyond and done something about it. Simon wishes NHW a very happy 30th birthday and on behalf of colleagues, thanked everyone for all their support and help.