Rural Crime

Elect Nicky Massey for PCC and I will fund more officers into the Rural Crime Action Team - and I will get more training for all officers on rural crime.

Hare Coursing, Fly tipping, Theft, Domestic abuse, Exploitation are all key issues for our rural areas.

Levelling up

Rural crime needs more funding there is a huge disconnect into the amount of funding spent on Urban v Rural crime across the Country. It’s no different in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.

Hare Coursing

We need better joined up working with all neighbouring counties, like the work with Operation Galileo hare coursing operation which is the across 11 counties, but also with the fight to prevent and stop and prosecute fly tippers.

The Damage Hare coursers do is both physical to the land, and also violence and harassment of farmers and people in rural areas including using very violent tactics to try and get people not to report Hare coursing.

Hare coursing itself it an abhorrent behaviour and the behaviour of the hare courses amount to terrorism of people and land owners.

We need better legislation with rural crime as the 1831 Game act is woefully out of date! I would use my voice as PCC to lobby alongside rural crime organisations for the change to that act, to enable police more powers for seizure and forfeit of dogs and equipment. Its shameful that the government is not taking rural crime seriously and hasn’t even looked at amending outdated acts to enable more police action and better court action to help prevent and deter rural crime including Hare Coursing.

101 and call handlers

We do need our call handlers to be properly trained on what rural crime is and how to properly grade it to get a policing response. More often then not the public is calling in dangerous driving, trespassing, wilful damage to crops and fields and even weapons but no police attends the scene. We need to change this.

Fly tipping

Fly tipping is costing our farmers and landowner millions and millions to remove off their land, very often waste that is labelled as dangerous as well. We should be asking central government to properly fund our rural areas to pay for the fly tipping to be removed centrally and not expected to come out of farmers and land owners pockets. In Cambridge City we have clear up days where we go round with huge skips and volunteers taking away peoples big rubbish items to prevent fly tipping. This should and could be replicated throughout the county and could reduce some of the fly tipping. Though some of the issues are from a business fly tipping instead of going to the tip, and for that harsher fines and a removal of business license is needed to prevent it.

Domestic abuse and other crimes

Rural crime is a huge problem and Cambridgeshire and Peterborough has huge amounts of rural areas with many farmers, small villages and houses. People in rural areas also have the same type of crime types that we see in urban areas, domestic abuse, Scams, burglary but also other types of crime such as the scourge of Hare Coursing.

Theft
It is upsetting to know that some farmers write off small damage and thefts of farm equipment as it happens to them so often. Why should our farmers and rural business expert to be burgled and nothing done about it? Why are we not investing into our rural areas to make everyone feel safe instead of allowing the cost of rural crime to creep up year on year. Cost of rural crime is now the highest it has been in 8 years, in 2019 it was 54 million!

Modern Day Slavery - Adult Exploitation

As evidenced in the recent case in our rural areas Modern slavery is still happening at an alarming rate. There are some great charities that are helping people both escape but also highlighting the signs to watch out for such as the Rosmini Centre and other organisations. As PCC I will work with these organisations to come together to be able to educate businesses and also residents on how to spot Modern day slavery and how to raise the alarm if you are concerned about someone.