CCTV has played a major, proactive and very successful role in fighting crime in Darlington since December 1994.
Originally set up to respond to public concerns about high levels of car crime and public disorder, the facility has continually grown, diversified and developed to include several residential areas. The Council also monitor CCTV for third parties including those at Darlington Railway Station in partnership with National Express East Coast and those belonging to Wear Valley District Council at Bishop Auckland and Crook town centres.
Successive bids to Home Office CCTV initiatives resulted in 5 awards valued in excess of £800,000. Collectively these more than doubled the size of the original installation.
The CCTV control centre continues to grow and diversify partly by utilizing surplus capacity to monitor alarms for private businesses in Darlington and beyond. The income secured from these contracts helps secure the overall operation and presents the opportunity to look at the further expansion of CCTV into other public areas where concerns about crime have been expressed.
By the end of 2008 the control room was monitoring 150 cameras, day and night, 365 days a year.
Why has Darlington's system been so successful in fighting crime from day one of operation?
There are 3 major reasons: Partnership working and being multi-functional; we do more than CCTV. New opportunities are constantly being sought, assessed and if complementary to the existing services, assimilated. Additionally extensive consultation exercises were carried out (and always are) with the public, businesses and users of the Town Centre (area covered by the original scheme), to see what people wanted and why. When a camera is installed it is because the ‘public’ want the camera(s) there.
The local police were consulted to establish high crime areas and those that were perceived to be high crime areas by the public. Once the camera sites were established the public were still kept in the picture and kept up to date on progress. These processes of communication continue with regular press articles and TV and radio coverage.
Members of the public and groups are encouraged to come and see the control room in operation for themselves and in the case of the residential areas, we join local community partnership groups whenever possible and regularly contribute articles to their newsletters, groups etc.
Much of the Town Centre is occupied by retail property and we are part of their organisation 'Crimenet' which was formed several years prior to CCTV. The installation of CCTV prompted them to move to radio communication. The control room joined the organisation and became the focal point for communication between the retailers and the police and a joint crackdown on retail crime.
Since then 'Pubwatch' has been developed to deal with problems in and around licensed premises.
The sharing of information and the pooling of resources has greatly increased the effectiveness of the individual groups involved and it is that which has brought and sustained the success.
The control room runs the response element of the Warden Link Service. Within 4 months of the control room going live, the staff were not only dealing with crime issues, but also responding to calls for help from older people and the disabled.
We have also taken on board other services. The local health trust runs a scheme aimed at allowing people to remain in their homes with additional care. Again, the control room act as the emergency response, this time to calls from health professionals. Most recently the control room has started to work with the local PCT and others to run a Tele health pilot for the people of Darlington.
Sometimes the question is asked: doesn’t the diversity stop you achieving the results required. If car crime is a measure then the answer is no. The figures for 2007 show that car crime in the Town Centre car parks are at 0.003 of one percent, based upon the use of the spaces. Having driven the car crime figures down from the high hundreds in the mid nineties, the professionalism and diligence of the staff have kept the figures at an incredibly low level ever since.
CCTV facts and figures from 2004 through to 2007 - [pdf document, 18.07kb].
Do we have any governing principles?
Yes, we do in the form of our Code of Practice - pdf document which is a public document.
We also have a free leaflet 'CCTV in Darlington' - pdf document. This summary provides details on who to contact should you require any further details on CCTV.
Bus Stop CCTV code of practice - pdf document
Bus Stop CCTV information leaflet - pdf document
Darlington Borough Council welcomes any comments that the public might have regarding the installation and use of CCTV. More information can be found on our making a complaint or comment pages.
There is a great deal more to the CCTV operation than shown here and we would be happy to discuss that in more detail with you.
Formal visits to the CCTV Control Room can be arranged but will only be allowed at the discretion of the Director of Corporate Services, General Manager or the CCTV Co- ordinator. Organised visits will be allowed to the Police, external organisations or businesses considering the relevance of CCTV in their area and to those carrying out any authentic research into CCTV. Requests for visits should in the first instance be made to the CCTV Co- ordinator either by letter or by telephoning 01325 388344
Please contact Graham Putt or Peter Bowerbank who will be happy to share our experiences and success with you.
