Working Well - Safety
Violent Crime
Introduction
The fear of crime and experiencing are key factors that affect people’s quality of life and sense of well-being.
There is a direct link to physical health through such things as violent injury, rape and other offences against the person. Mental health is affected via the psychological trauma of experiencing crimes such as burglary or vandalism.
Fear of crime affects the health of the wider community through for example, restrictions on unsupervised outdoor play for children and social isolation of older people.
Fear of crime can have a devastating effect on quality of life and more focus is being placed upon providing reassurance to residents and ensuring that they know how best to protect themselves from becoming a victim without raising fear unnecessarily.
Violent Crime
Within the north east, Hartlepool had the third highest rate of hospital admissions for violence 2015/16-2017/18.
Hartlepool's rate of 70.7 per 100,000 population in 2015/16-2017/18 is the lowest rate for Hartlepool across the seven year reporting period. Hartlepool's rate is still significantly larger than the England average, however the gap between England and Hartlepool is 30.8% smaller than it was in 2009/10-2011/12. Across the same period against the north east average, Hartlepool has closed the gap from 25.5 per 100,000 in 2009/10-2011/12 to 3.3 per 100,000 in 2014/15-2016/17. Hartlepool had reached a level of statistical similarity to the north east average in 2013/14-2015/16, and after falling back to statistical inferiority in 2014/15-2016/17, Hartlepool has again reached a position of statistical similarity.
For violent offences, Hartlepool has the 4th lowest rate in the north east in 2017/18.
However, Hartlepool's 2017/18 rate is the highest level in the 8 year reporting period. Hartlepool's rate 2017/18 of 26.2 per 1,000 population is 86% larger than the 2010/11 rate of 14.1 per 1,000. Across the reporting period the gap between Hartlepool and England has remained quite stable, and currently sits at 2.5 per 1,000. This was largely also true for the gap between Hartlepool and the north east, however in the 2017/18 data Hartlepool is now below the north east average for the first time in the reporting period, as the north east rate has increased with greater intensity than both Hartlepool and England since 2014/15.
Cleveland Police data from the 12 month period November 2017 to October 2018 shows that Hartlepool's violent crime figures display a general increase throughout the year.
There was a month on month increase 8 times throughout the reporting year, and the level of violent crime at the end of the reporting period is 93% larger than it was at the beginning.
Violent crime is the second largest type of crime in Hartlepool, only anti-social behaviour is more frequent. Violent offences account for 18.84% of offences in Hartlepool during this period.
Hartlepool had the second largest violent crime rate within the Cleveland Police area, larger than both Stockton and Redcar, but substantially smaller than the Middlesbrough rate.
In June 2018 violent offences are 1.6 times the recorded frequency than they were in June 2015 in Hartlepool. Across this period Hartlepool's increase in violent offences is smaller than both the Cleveland Police force area, and that of the group of most similar areas.
Violent Crime
Current Services
Hartlepool Community Safety Team currently commissions the Bob Farrow (Belle Vue) Centre to provide a Targeted Youth Outreach Service to engage with young people who are identified as being at risk of anti-social behaviour and / or crime. Young people are diverted into positive activities and a specific programme (The Sorted Programme) has been developed which is a series of brief interventions on topics including violent crime (knife crime, County Lines etc). The Outreach Service is currently grant funded by the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner, however this is due to will cease in March 2020.
Future Intentions
Work is ongoing within the Council to identify and secure future funding for the Targeted Youth Outreach Service.
In March 2019, The Safer Hartlepool Partnership agreed to adopt a Public Health Approach to tackle violence in Hartlepool, however the development of this approach is still in the early stages.