Frustration over police calls
WOLSINGHAM residents frustrated with the 0845 police incident telephone number have won support from a Wear Valley policeman.At a parish council meeting in Wolsingham Town Hall on Tuesday night, PC Frank Hewison expressed concern about the 08456060365 number wasting valuable time.
One particular incident left Pc Hewison yards from rowdy youths on a building site on St Anne¹s Drive, Wolsingham totally unaware that a complaint had been made.
A delay in the message meant it took 40 minutes in total for Pc Hewison to respond to the call, even though he was parked in Wolsingham Market Place.
In response to this, Pc Frank Hewison said: ³That comes back to our call centre I¹m afraid.
³The call was 30 minutes late- that¹s the way it works at the moment.
³It¹s complaints at every meeting we go to but I don¹t have the answer.
Parish councillor Martin Bell said: ³The response by local police has been very good but the call centre is a problem.
³One Sunday afternoon, I rang to report graffiti going on at the Mill and it was a waste of time.
³It damages the relationship we have with the police.² Speaking after the meeting, Cllr Bell, who is a milkman in the area, said:
³The call centre is a big issue.
³If I catch somebody now, I try and ring the landowner first and then the police.
³The answer would be to go back to the old system when you could ring your local police office and know who you¹re talking too.² PC Hewison said after the meeting: ³ We do get complaints about the delay but it all surrounds the new set up with the control rooms.
³People complain that they don¹t get the same level of service now.² Parish Cllr Ken Rogers said: ³People are sick and tired of anti social behaviour so it doesn¹t get reported anymore.² But Superintendent Barry Knevitt, head of communications has defended the system, which has run for the past year and a half and covers the whole of County Durham and Darlington.
He said: ³The system is not too complicated it¹s about getting used to it.
³Yes we have had complaints from police officers concerning several issues I make no bones about that.
³Communications staff have criticisms of police staff not updating their equipment so staff know where they are.
³There are a lot of issues around politics.
³People do not want to see centralised communications they see it as a dilution of services for their area.² ³There have been serious problems with under staffing which we have recognised and now we are recruiting more and changing the shift system.
³If we have six staff answering calls and seven calls then somebody is going to have to wait.
³If it¹s an emergency people should not be frightened to ring 999.
³We are answering 98 per cent of our 999 calls within 20 seconds.² An apparent patchy local knowledge on the part of control room staff has also been causing problems.
PC Hewison said: ³We are guided by technology and a satellite system so call outs are done by postcode.
³You might get a policeman from Consett who doesn¹t know the area and doesn¹t know where the recreation ground is.² Cllr. Bell said: ³I¹ve rang before when the operator did not know where Wolsingham was.² Superintendent Barry Knevitt said: ³We are doing more training with staff to show them how to use the system again properly and educating staff about local areas and key local people.²