Everyone has the right to a life free from anti-social behaviour, crime, and disturbance. Your Labour councillors know from first-hand experience that it is often the most vulnerable and poorest in our community who suffer the most from crime. Getting serious about community safety has been a cornerstone of Labour’s delivery in City Hall since 2006. We will maintain and expand this focus. We will do so despite the Tory government cuts to the police service and the huge impact of organised crime moving into the city through ‘County Lines’ drug-dealing activities.

A Labour City Council will:

1. Continue to deliver upon our Community Safety Fund and Community Safety Strategy to help residents make their communities better, safer places to live. Possible uses of the fund include help with fitting and repairing alley gates, and support with the formation of democratically constituted residents’ associations, to help build and enhance community cohesion.

2. Coordinate the Safer Norwich Partnership, working with stakeholders to address community safety concerns across the city.

3. Continue to expand CCTV across all communities in our city with the purchase of additional cameras. We will build on earlier success through the £500,000 upgrade to deliver state of the art CCTV in the city centre and the communities which make up the city. This will help continue to make Norwich safer. Labour will also continue to invest in additional relocatable CCTV, to be used in areas of the city which experience most crime or anti-social behaviour.

4. Work to make the city a safer, more inclusive, and welcoming place by delivering our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy. Provide support, advice, and events for members of our community with protected characteristics. Combating hate crime is a priority for Labour, a party which has proudly resisted discrimination, harassment and victimisation, and championed our public sector equality duty, both in government and at grass roots level.

5. Tackle domestic abuse by working with partners across both the statutory and voluntary sectors to provide additional safe houses for victims of abuse, one of which is guaranteed for victims who have no recourse to public funds.

6. Continue to support residents through tackling anti-social behaviour in our communities, allowing people to live peacefully in their homes without fear. We will continue to work with Norfolk Constabulary to tackle drug dealing, domestic abuse, “county lines”, child sexual exploitation, modern slavery, and crime and disorder in the city.

7. We will continue to enforce tenancy agreements through the court system and seek immediate possession of properties where tenancy agreements have been breached, specifically in relation to Class A drugs. We will not tolerate violent County Line gangs operating from our council houses, disrupting the lives of people in our community.

8. Continue to support proposals which will reduce the maximum stake on fixed odds betting terminals to £2.00. We will update our licensing policies to ensure their relevance – this includes detailed profiling of wards to help anyone who wants to make their views known. We will help protect the public and reduce problem gambling.

9. Continue to lobby for streetlights to be turned back on by Norfolk County Council. Upgrade City Council lighting in Norwich to LED, in spaces that we have responsibility for.

10. Continue to implement our 12-point plan to make the night-time economy safer and more pleasant for those using it and for those living in the area. Maintain our Purple Flag status award through our close work with the police and Business Improvement District.

11. Continue to support tenants impacted by noise nuisance and develop a good neighbourhood policy for our tenants to provide support when the threshold for antisocial behaviour is not reached.

12. Take tough and effective action against licensed premises that flout their conditions by allowing underage drinking or fostering anti-social behaviour.

13. Support and encourage Pubwatch and work with the police to bar anyone convicted of an alcohol-related offence from all licensed premises until we receive clear evidence of rehabilitation and behaviour change. We will also promote Betwatch to monitor the increasing number of gambling outlets in the city.

14. Continue to speak up for the residents of Norwich at the Police and Crime Panel scrutiny meetings, making sure that the needs of the city are heard.

15. Engage with students, universities, the police, and other partners to ensure students feel safe in the night-time economy and wider city and ensure students in the community can access relevant information on council services relevant to them, such as waste management, and on being a good neighbour.

16. Continue to be a key player in county-wide Emergency Planning procedures with regular testing of our partnership working arrangements so we are in good shape to meet the unexpected.

17. Continue proactive work with partners such as the police and neighbouring local authorities to ensure that private hire vehicles are safe and licensed.

18. Consider the expansion of the PSPO to support tackling nuisance street drinking.