The Gazette in Blackpool has claimed a major victory for its Respect campaign, after the resort was this week named as one of the Government’s 40 ‘Respect areas’.
The newspaper launched its own Respect campaign a year ago after a catalogue of attacks on frontline emergency crews.
It has now welcomed the Home Office announcement that Blackpool Council is one of the local authorities that will use their full range of powers to tackle anti-social behaviour.
All 40 Respect areas have agreed to:
The Department for Education and Skills is backing the battle to keep neighbourhoods safe by investing an additional £6m over the next year for parenting classes in these 40 areas.
The Norwich Evening News had also launched its own campaign to clampdown on anti-social behaviour, Reclaim our Communities, and the city is also among the 40 ‘respect areas’.
The campaign looked at everything from fly-tipping to graffiti, dog fouling and gangs of yobs roaming the streets at night, and the paper highlighted readers’ stories as well as calling for action.
Evening News editor David Bourn said: “Obviously we are all delighted.
“We launched the campaign four months ago because we were getting lots of letters, e-mails and phone calls from readers saying that anti-social behaviour, in all its manifestations, was having a poor effect on their lives.
“We found that generally people were reluctant to contact police or other authorities for fear of reprisals and so wanted to give them a voice.
“It’s great that this has been recognised with some extra cash.”
But not all calls for action were answered, as Grimsby was not named among the 40 ‘respect areas’, despite the Telegraph’s well-supported Enough! campaign.
A petition handed over to the House of Commons last week had been signed by more than 8,000 people – the biggest response the paper had seen to a campaign in recent years.
News editor Lucy Wood said: “Our readers, the council and MP Austin Mitchell were disappointed when we found out North East Lincolnshire wasn’t in the list of 40 Respect Action Areas, particularly on the back of our campaign.
“Anti-social behaviour is a very real problem in North East Lincolnshire, and it’s generally agreed we need some sort of help.
“We made a direct appeal to the Respect office on our front page, pleading with them to include us in the funding round. But it was not to be – and it was very frustrating.
“But there is light at the end of the tunnel. Mr Mitchell met with Respect tsar Louise Casey this week, and has said we may possibly be in a second wave of funding, although a date has yet to be announced.”
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