Local Policing Teams highly mobile

They’ve never been so easy to get on the phone, according to the latest statistics released by Police Minister Liza Harvey.

Mrs Harvey announced last week that people had embraced the idea of calling Local Policing Teams (LPTs) to discuss crime issues in their neighbourhoods, since LPTs were given their own mobiles nine months ago.

She said in a recent review conducted over six days, members of the public contacted the 148 LPT mobiles on 472 occasions.

“I’m encouraged the public has embraced the Local Police Team mobile phone initiative, which along with growing social media use, is helping to build on the relationship between officers and their community,” she said.

The minister praised the professionalism of Local Police Teams, which returned 95 per cent of unanswered calls within 24 hours.

Mrs Harvey said it was important for callers to leave a message if their call went unanswered.

A key initiative of the Frontline 2020 model is each LPT having its own mobile phone number, giving members of the community the ability to ring their team directly to discuss local community issues.