Officers’ daily challenge of keeping Newham streets safe

The Newham recorder went on a day shift with Newham Police to see what their day involves (Image: Archant)

In the last year between August 2014 and 2015 the borough saw an overall number of 29,547 crimes compared to 28,747 from the year before, according to statistics revealed by the Met.

So, it comes as no surprise that officers were kept busy attending to a list of emergency calls one after the other when the Recorder accompanied them on a shift last Friday.

“The number of calls we can go to on average on a shift varies but it can be anything from 10 to 30 in emergency calls, explained Police Constable Simon Vickers during the shift.

“With S-graded calls, we can have anything between 30 to 100 incidents. These are related to non-emergency calls which are dealt with within an hour.”

Altogether, PC Vickers and his colleague, PC Nick Perry headed to four separate incidents, resulting in one arrest, during the three-and-a-half hours the Recorder spent with them.

One of the incidents related to a fight between a group of approximately six teenage boys, in Prince Regent Lane, Plaistow, at about 3.30pm. This resulted in one victim suffering a swollen arm.

Another case related to a domestic issue, which saw a man in his 30s arrested, after he allegedly hit a woman on the head following an argument in Howards Road, Plaistow. The victim did not suffer any serious injuries and did not require hospital treatment.

Inspector Lewis Hastie, who heads the Emergency Response Patrol Team, said: “We want the public to have the opportunity to see what our police constables do day in day out.

“Our team work really busy shifts and are constantly on the go every single day.

“Once they have dealt with one incident, it is on to the next one straight away.”

He added: “We want to continue working with the public and the community to tackle crime in the borough and for that we need the public to help us help them.”