Rochdale police column: How we are engaging with communities and why

Inspector Robert MacGregor, of the Rochdale East Neighbourhood Policing Team, on what the police are doing to tackle local issues across the borough.

This week he discusses the way local police are trying to engage with communities and why.

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Since I first joined the Police, and particularly since I went to Neighbourhood Policing (12 years ago!) I have heard from communities about how much they value their 'Bobby on the Beat' and how they want to see their officers on patrol more often. It has been made constantly clear to me how valuable seeing your local officer is. This is such a common refrain and seen as so obvious that it can sound a bit strange to ask 'Why is that so important to people?'. I want to use this article to challenge the idea that seeing a Bobby on the Beat is an effective way of judging your Neighbourhood Policing Team.

Policing has changed so much over the last 20 years that your local officers are as active in your neighbourhoods as they have ever been - but less visible day-to-day. I want to explain why that is, and set out the work we are doing to be more visible in the virtual age. We are trying to do this not by trying to turn back time to a Dixon of Dock Green era by simply telling police constables to walk their beats more, but instead trying different ways to utilise social media and treating rapid technological change as an opportunity rather than something to be feared.

When I joined the police 20 years ago, we concentrated almost exclusively on crime. We did attend what was then known as domestic violence and we made referrals to other agencies, we searched for missing children and we had departments dedicated to safeguarding and public protection. Neighbourhood teams did partnership work - although even as a Neighbourhood PC back then I really only played at it, it was not something that was central to what I did. I attended meetings with partner agencies and partnership work was something I engaged in on an ad hoc basis. It was always clear to me that my actual job was to attend crimes, anything else was a 'nice to do'.

Wind forward to 2020 and now partnership work and safeguarding is our core role. The role of a Neighbourhood PC has changed beyond all recognition. If I travelled in time from when I was a Neighbourhood PC in 2005 and arrived in the Neighbourhood Office at Rochdale today, I would not know where to begin. The problems are more complex, risk and vulnerability so much better understood, and the expectation of the safeguarding role of the police has increased massively.

The activity that a Neighbourhood PC carries out today will regularly include visiting vulnerable people in their homes, visiting care homes and children at risk, attending strategy meetings with social services to discuss vulnerable children and families. These are all activities which protect the most vulnerable people in our community. The work being carried out prevents terrible experiences from being inflicted on these people. They are also activities about which we can share so little, and which take place behind closed doors and lead to concern about local officers not being on the beat any longer.

We still spend time on patrol, walking streets, speaking to people, but it has to be a smaller part of the role than it was when I first arrived on Neighbourhood Policing. Ironically, as the Neighbourhood Policing Team is protecting people more effectively than ever, the perception is that they are doing less as they are not seen on patrol.

We will never return to a time (if it existed) of having your local Bobby on foot all day and to be honest, I wouldn't want to. There is too much important work that would need to be ignored to return to those times. However, visibility and reassuring the community that we are present in their neighbourhood is essential. These two points are difficult to reconcile but we are trying new ways of being visible and building trust with you. Some of our ideas will not work but we have to try some new approaches or we will begin to lose the link between police and residents which are so crucial to our intelligence gathering and feelings of safety.

The first way we have started to improve our engagement is to look at our community and consider what platforms we can use to reach as much of the demographic as possible based on what media they follow. Rochdale Online has been a really helpful way of me trying to explain in some detail what is happening and why we make some of the decisions we make. With a significant readership it allows anyone who wants to know the overarching objectives of the team to be included in those discussions and to respond if they wish.

PC Matt Honey started to trial using the social media platform TikTok a couple of months ago (Username- @PCMatt). Matt is a funny and very personable guy and his character lends itself well to this platform. Matt has built an audience of 8,000 followers in that period and regularly posts short clips about his work in the neighbourhood. By way of example, his most recent video shows him assisting a blind resident who was having difficulty, doing the washing up and hoovering the house. The wider community would be unaware of this work were it not for using this platform, but now the community are aware the feedback is highly positive. My experience is that when we show the community what we are doing that we are supported, it is rare (but not unheard of) for our activities to not be seen as overwhelmingly positive. The problem arises when there is no awareness of what is going on.

We have run an online live video community meeting. 3,500 watched that stream live and hundreds participated in the question and answer session. I would like to do this again soon but we ran it as a pilot and need to make some changes to the technical side before we try it again but it will be taking place. In the meantime PCSO Rachael Adams and PCSO Andy Grey are arranging a video meeting with children from a local school to discuss any issues they are facing in the community and good citizenship.

PC James Thomsen is imminently beginning a weekly podcast where he responds to questions asked by residents across the district. This will be short - probably no longer than 10 minutes an episode. I want James to be able to have a relaxed, local conversation with the community. Not speaking as though reading a press release but instead being able to engage in a meaningful two-way dialogue with local people about issues he personally understands and is dealing with.

Every day your officers are on patrol in your community - this is still important to us, but I see every single shift the work being done by my colleagues and I want to share as much of that as I can through as many different platforms as I can so that we maintain your support and so you can feel confident in us as your local team.