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More than 100 new business crime reduction partnerships have been created from scratch by Action Against Business Crime (AABC) in its first two years, more than one a week.
Marking its second anniversary on September 1, AABC – a collaboration between the Home Office and British Retail Consortium โ is announcing it has overtaken the targets it was set, forming 106 crime-beating partnerships for less than £8,500 each.
Lord Dear is chairman of AABC. The former West Midlands chief constable, HM Inspector of Constabulary from 1990-1997, was made a crossbench (non-party-political) peer earlier this year. He said: โThis has been a really tremendous achievement. We have had very limited resources but the Home Office and police now have a network of working business crime partnerships to help them reduce crime and disorder in our towns and cities. They are all self-funding and are here for the long-term.โ
Business crime reduction partnerships have a paid-up membership. Members share information about crime and criminals via radio links, CCTV, and have information and photograph sharing agreements with police. They use exclusion notice schemes, banning known thieves and trouble-makers from the premises of all members in a partnership.
To create each partnership AABC had to convince organisations, including businesses, police and local authorities, that the best way to deal with town centre business crime and disorder was to work together.
What they say
Mike Schuck, Chief Executive of AABC said: โWe have created a unique system of partnerships in this country which is the envy of overseas visitors. Increasingly the partnerships, and police, are linked to our national database, which is providing real-time intelligence on business crime. We want to develop the partnership system further and increase our ability to contribute to crime reduction and community safety.โ
Before AABC began in 2004 it had taken nearly 10 years to create the first 100 partnerships. The rapid expansion achieved since then means there are now more than 200 business partnerships in England and Wales with over 30,000 business members.
About AABC
A partnership between the Home Office and the British Retail Consortium, its service level agreement with the Home Office required AABC to create 100 partnerships in two years. AABC and its four regional business crime managers have created 106 partnerships in towns and cities across England and Wales in that time. All partnerships are notified to the Information Commissioner to enable them to share data about people and all work to strict criteria established and periodically inspected by AABC.
