Burglary hotspots in Bristol are being listed for walkabouts by Council staff, police and other agencies as part of a drive to cut break-ins.

The campaign’s priority is areas of Bristol which account for 20 percent of the city’s burglaries although they contain only 10 percent of its houses. The walkabouts are being organised by Safer Bristol and include representatives of the police and Bristol City Council’s Clean and Green Team and its Housing Department. The aim is to identify areas for improvement and they are taking place in specific streets identified as being especially vulnerable to opportunist burglaries as a way to reduce the fear of crime.

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Cutrs in the frequency of household refuse collections are contributing to an increase in disputes between neighbours, according to research published today. The study from Halifax Home Insurance shows that after a decade of improvement, reports of neighbour disturbances have risen by a third in two years

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Co-operative trust schools support the Children’s Plan and this publication from the Department for Children Families and Schools outlines their benefits.

The Children’s Trust school pilot was launched in September 2008 and involves 100 schools. The purpose of the pilot is to support the Children’s Plan’ which aims to make England the best place in the world for children and young people to grow up by putting their needs at the centre of educational policy.

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By W. Warner Burke, Dale G. Lake and Jill Waymire Paine (Editors)

This volume contains the must reads for a depth of understanding about organization change. Each of the book’s seventy-five papers included in this volume have launched their own fields of inquiry or practices and are the key readings for any student or practitioner of organization development.

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Specialist training to help councils and other public bodies improve their customer services has been launched nationally following a pilot scheme led by the Merseyside Improvement and Efficiency Partnership. Six local authorities and Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service used the one-day training course.

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More councils are using the social media network Twitter to interact with local people according to research carried out by ntl:Telewest Business. It has found that 42 per cent of authorities are using an official Twitter account to inform people about local events, news and job opportunities.

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Public service professionals should be liberated from bureaucracy and over management and freed to focus on serving the public. Above all, they should be trusted to get on with the job. This call comes from Demos in a publication ‘Leading from the front’.

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The first councils have now signed up to the new national customer service standard launched earlier this year by the Institute of Customer Service. The Institute’s ServiceMark helps to put people at the heart of town hall, education and health strategies.

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This programme is now available to view on localgov.tv the online television channel for public service modernisation. It looks at Lancashire County Council’s Business Improvement Programme which has delivered efficiency savings of over £10 million across its IT portfolio. The Council’s achievements have been recognised as Best Practice by HM Treasury.

Read more on BUSINESS IMPROVEMENT IN LANCASHIRE…

The Home Office has launched a new initiative to target prolific offenders and disrupt the sale of stolen goods in areas where burglary and robbery are rising.

The Vigilance Programme will involve pre-emptive support, training and additional resources to 35 areas facing challenges of rising crime. Local plans include: targeted police operations that follow and film prolific burglars, monitoring vehicles coming and going in high-crime neighbourhoods as well as providing additional officers to monitor known prolific offenders and disrupt stolen goods markets.

Read more on CRACKDOWN ON EMERGING CRIME HOTSPOTS…