​Rural crime, speeding on rural roads, and antisocial behaviour part of Wolds Policing Plan

​Lincolnshire Police’s neighbourhood policing teams (NPTs) have set out eight new accessible plans, one for each area of the county, detailing how they will keep communities safe.

The Lincolnshire Wolds has been recognised as one of the most scenic areas of the East Midlands, and as our area is popular for tourism and our roads carry all of the traffic to the coast with other main routes between Grimsby and Boston, there is a disproportionate amount of traffic for such a rural area.

The three areas in the neighbourhood policing plan that police will focus on are 'stop crime and antisocial behaviour’, ‘protect people from harm’ and ‘help those in need’.

Here in the Wolds, the Wolds Policing Plan will see the NPT work with local schools to educate children about safety, as well as educating people around the safe use of bicycles, tackling the anti-social use of bikes and e-scooters, and using specialist investigative teams and the Roads Policing Unit (RPU) to tackle rural crime.

Operation Deepdale has also begun to address the ongoing issues of drug supply and related criminality, and dispersal orders will also continue to be used to tackle antisocial behaviour and serious violence in the Wolds area.

To protect residents in the Wolds from harm, Operation California will operate to combat the use of recreational drugs during the nighttime economy in the Wolds district, and the NPT has pledged to work closely with licensees and local councils to reduce violence, as well as patrolling lively night time areas and the provision of drink spiking advice and preventative measures.

The NPT will tackle travelling criminals using our roads by liaising with other forces and use technology such as ANPR to deploy the right resources at the right time, as well as working with communities most affected by speeding and antisocial use of vehicles to provide speed checks, establishing community speedwatch schemes in conjunction with the Lincolnshire Road Safety Partnership (LRSP) and carrying out surveys where there is a perception of speeding to better understand where there are problems.

Inspector Matt Bennison of the Neighbourhood Policing – Wolds team, said: “While the Wolds is a very safe place to live and visit, there are ongoing issues in our local towns in line with other places of similar population.

"The geography and distances involved present challenges to policing that we are working hard to address through partnership working and early intervention. This reduces demand, allowing us to focus our attention on the areas that affect the community the most.

"This means that we are relying on data and evidence to establish where we need to focus our attention and are working to ensure we have the information we need to deploy our staff as effectively as possible.

There will also be a focus on being accessible to the public both in person and through digital means such as social media, StreetSafe and by phone.

"We will be working hard to ensure seldom heard communities are given a voice.

Over the coming year I will be working closely with other departments within the police service along with our external partners to ensure that the Wolds remains a safe place to live, work and visit and, as importantly, to ensure that people feel safe.”