Communities and Local Government

• Communities and neighbourhoods
• Neighbourhood renewal
• Anti-social behaviour

Communities and neighbourhoods

Anti-social behaviour

Anti-social behaviour (ASB) can devastate people's lives and runs down our communities and that is why the Government is committed to tackling it not tolerating it.

Anti-social behaviour covers a wide range of selfish and unacceptable activity that can blight the quality of community life. Examples include:

• nuisance neighbours
• yobbish behaviour and intimidating groups taking over public spaces
• vandalism, graffiti and fly-posting
• people dealing and buying drugs on the street
• people dumping rubbish and abandoned cars
• begging and anti-social drinking
• the misuse of fireworks
• reckless driving of mini-motorbikes

Communities and Local Government is supporting a range of activity as part of a cross-Government drive to ensure that the public is able to live in neighbourhoods free from the corrosive effects of intimidation and harassment. We want to see both police and local authorities using the ASB powers they have been given in a way that is effective and responds to people's needs at the right time.

Tackling anti-social behaviour is the joint responsibility of a range of agencies including the police, local councils and landlords, and the best results are achieved where these agencies work together in partnership. The community can also play an important role in working with local agencies to take successful action against anti-social behaviour.

But in order to do this, the community need to know where to go to get help and that's why we've produced a short leaflet setting out the role of the police and councils in tackling anti-social behaviour which also contains advice on how to go about contacting them. The leaflet will be delivered to over 10 million households in the coming weeks and can be downloaded from this page.

If you want to know who to contact in your area, go to www.direct.gov.uk/localcrime (external link) and type in your postcode.

The leaflet is just one of number of initiatives that Communities and Local Government is funding through the £10 million funding we announced recently.

We are doing a range of other things to improve local services tackling ASB, and to give people more skills and confidence to deal with it.

Other work includes:

Local awareness and training events

These events provide an opportunity for front line staff and residents to learn more about the tools and powers available to tackle anti-social behaviour. By bringing local people together to share best practice we can encourage joint problem solving. There will be 3 training events running in each region in February to March this year and we are encouraging citizens, front-line staff and practitioners to visit www.asb-events.org (external link) or call 0845 680 9754 (9am to 6pm Monday to Friday) to register their interest in the events or sign up for a specific local event in their area as these become available.

Tenant and Resident ASB Champions

We want to help local people gain the skills, knowledge and confidence to organise their communities to tackle ASB and hold agencies to account where they are not delivering the required level of service. We will be providing training to residents and tenants in 62 priority areas to enable them to do this. Further details about this programme will be available shortly.

Extra financial support to local councils

Over £6 million of our funding went direct to priority local authorities to spend on local ASB problems and priorities. Examples of how councils might use the funding include:

• supporting the delivery of minimum standards of service on ASB by March 2010 e.g. by providing regular information to residents on what action is being taken to tackle ASB
• training frontline staff in use of tools and powers - including housing practitioners, neighbourhood managers and police
• training/ raising awareness amongst local activists
• environmental clean up campaigns in selected neighbourhoods to demonstrate quick, visible difference to local residents

For more information about the councils that got additional funding to tackle ASB you can read our news release.

ASB Housing Action team

The Tenant Services Authority (TSA) have commissioned the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) to work with landlords across the social housing domain to support them in tackling Anti Social Behaviour (ASB). Managed by CIH, the team will seek to share existing best practice, help landlords make the best use of existing resources and ultimately help secure improvements in services delivered to tenants.

Tools and powers guide for social landlords

We want to provide up to date best practice information to social landlords on the tools and powers available to ensure that they have the latest knowledge at their fingertips. The Chartered Institute for Housing has been commissioned to produce guidance which will be published shortly so watch this space for information.

Tenant toolkit

We want tenants to be just as familiar as social landlords with the tools and powers available to tackle anti-social behaviour so that they can challenge their landlords to take effective action. To make this happen, the TSA will be publishing an online toolkit to help tenants navigate their way through the tools and powers available.

Respect standard

Social landlords will need to meet national standards that will be set and enforced by the Tenant Services Authority (TSA), the new social housing regulator. The TSA is proposing to set a standard that will include specific requirements on ASB. This is likely to draw on key elements of the existing Respect Standard for Housing Management, which we anticipating updating to ensure that it remains a key sector led driver of good practice on ASB, in the coming months.

For more information about a range of ongoing work to tackle ASB please visit www.direct.gov.uk/localcrime (external link).

Related publications

• Tackling anti-social behaviour

  • Published: 9 February 2010
  • Site: Communities and neighbourhoods