Tackling Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) in the Arborfield, Spencers Wood and Shinfield areas which has had a significant community impact.

E-scooters have been seized as a result of the recent S34 dispersal orders and suspects are being dealt with.

Section 34 Dispersal Orders - giving the police powers to disperse anyone they believe to be involved in ASB and preventing them from returning within 48 hours - were authorised and placed on areas within the following roads: Hyde End Road, B3349, Hyde End Lane, Grovelands Road, Clares Green Road, Ryeish Lane, Church Lane, Deardon Way, Allen Way, Bolton Drive and Beke Avenue, Langley Mead and Spencers Wood Pavilion on the 19th & 28th of March and the 4th of April.

You will have seen an influx of policing units and officers patrolling around those areas due to disturbances and ASB from the previous days which subsequently escalated.

The Neighbourhood Team are working with our partners and the local community to intervene as early as possible when ASB occurs. Our Long-term Problem Solving plan for ASB includes working with our partner agencies, such as the ASB Team at Wokingham Borough Council, to patrol these areas, identify those responsible and manage persistent offenders and locations. We will continue to carry out intervention work at local schools and youth groups to help prevent issues from occurring in the first place.

We will also continue our work with the local authority to look at ways of improving the area and provide activities for youths to engage in.

Anti-social use of motorbikes, e-scooters, dirt bikes and quadbikes throughout the area - in particular, issues with youths riding bikes through and nearby into wooded areas.

The Neighbourhood Policing Team are conducting high-visibility patrols and community engagement in identified hotspot areas. We will be commencing operations regarding e-bikes and e-scooters and will conduct an operation regarding the nearby farm fields where people go on their bikes.

It is not currently possible to get insurance for privately owned e-scooters. This means it’s illegal to use them on the road or in public spaces, such as parks, street pavements, and shopping centres.

If you use a privately-owned e-scooter in public, you risk the vehicle being seized under S.165 Road Traffic Act 1988 for having no insurance.

If you cause serious harm to another person whilst riding an e-scooter, the incident will be investigated in the same way it would if you were riding a motorcycle or driving a car.

Please be advised that If you breech the rules when using an e-scooter you could face a fixed penalty notice.The fixed penalty notice could include:
a £300 fine and six penalty points on your licence for having no insurance
a £100 fine and three to six penalty points for riding without the correct licence

You could also be committing an offence if you are caught:
- riding on a pavement: fixed penalty notice and possible £50 fine
- using a mobile phone or other handheld mobile device while riding: £200 and six penalty points
- riding through red lights: fixed penalty notice, £100 fine and possible penalty points
- drink driving: the same as if you were driving a car, you could face court imposed fines, a driving ban and possible imprisonment

The Neighbourhood Team ran an operation on 31st May – where we had 3 stop searches under the Misuse of Drugs Act, issued 2 e-scooter warning letters and made 2 arrests – one for a DV assault and TWOC of a moped and one for failing to provide a sample of saliva for analyst via a drugs swipe. 1 scooter was seized under S165 Road Traffic Act for no insurance and 2 x S59 warnings were given for anti-social use of mopeds. These vehicles can be seized if seen acting in an anti-social way in the future.

We will be planning more ops over the summer and continue to target and ID those involved.

Shoplifting, retail crime and violence towards shop workers in Shinfield and Arborfield.

The Neighbourhood Policing Team have recently conducted targeted operations which will be continued in other stores across Wokingham. During one of our shifts, we apprehended two suspects for shoplifting.

A robust approach to tackling retail crime in the Thames Valley has been introduced by the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC). Developed jointly with retailers, business groups and Thames Valley Police (TVP), the PCC’s Retail Crime Strategy sets out tangible actions to tackle shoplifting, retail crime and violence towards shop workers.
The strategy aims to support businesses and create a hostile environment for those who commit crimes in the local economy by focusing on 6 key pillars – Intelligence, Enforcement, Partnership, Prevention, Justice and Reassurance. It also includes the creation of a Business Crime Team within TVP to improve investigations and identify prolific offenders and, with the rollout of Operation Purchase, the Force’s operational response to retail crime, increasing the visible presence of police officers and PCSOs in retail spaces as well as improving the officer response to reports, particularly incidents involving violence towards staff.
A core aim is to enhance the collaboration between businesses and the police to better tackle retail crime in addition to the policing response. To help facilitate this, access is being provided to Disc – an online information-sharing and reporting platform which allows retailers to report and access information about crime such as shoplifting and anti-social behaviour (ASB). The system, which can be accessed as an app, also makes reporting to the police faster and more efficient as users can submit a crime report directly through the platform, removing the need to call 101. We believe these measures will deliver a more visible, targeted and robust response to retail crime, increase the security and confidence of local businesses and help make high streets and retail spaces across the Thames Valley safer for the community.