What is Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB)?
The term anti-social behaviour covers a wide range of selfish and unacceptable activity that can blight the quality of community life. Terms such as ‘nuisance’, ‘disorder’ and ‘harassment’ are also used to describe some of this behaviour.
Examples include:
- Nuisance neighbours
- Yobbish behaviour and intimidating groups taking over public spaces
- Vandalism, graffiti and fly-tipping
- 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
What should you do?
Keep a record or diary of problems as they occur. Be as specific as you can in recording names, times, locations and what actually happened.
Report it! On average, 7 out of 10 cases reported have a successful outcome.
If the incident is a crime, please contact the police on 0345 456 4564 (non-emergencies). In case of emergency, please dial 999.
Where social housing tenants are involved, you can report directly to the Housing Agency.
For graffiti removal, discarded needles, noise complaints, abandoned cars, rubbish etc., please contact your local district council.
ASB and minimum standards
In line with other local authorities around the country, Cambridgeshire has adopted a number of minimum standards on how we deal with ASB. This is our pledge to the public:
-
Cambridgeshire Community Safety Partnerships will endeavour to reduce the public’s perception of anti-social behaviour year on year
-
The partnerships will provide regular updates for every community on what is being done to tackle anti-social behaviour
-
We aim to provide support and help to all victims of anti-social behaviour
-
The partnerships will ensure effective collaboration between neighbourhood policing teams and other local partners to be able to respond to problems in a timely manner
-
We will provide residents with a right of complaint to Community Safety Partnerships if satisfactory action is not taken by local agencies through existing channels
The Government and ASB
The Home Office is providing a wide range of support for tackling anti-social behaviour in the communities. For up-to-date information on latest initiatives and access to resources available to practitioners, please visit the Home Office ASB web site.