Last year the East Dulwich councillors Richard Thomas, Jonathan Mitchell and myself established a £50,000 Crime Reduction fund.

One idea from the East Dulwich Police Safer Neighbourhood Team Sergeant Duncan Jackson was for a hand held metal detector. I warmly accepted it and we quickly made our first purchase. The idea being that Police officers with a pocket metal detector could sweep someone they stopped for metals objects whether knives, guns or even needles. The first type we purchased was a big flat thing that could with a squeeze fit in a large pocket. Not very hand held. So we tried the next type. This attaches via a holder to a standard issue Police belt. They’ve tried it and found it works a treat and it has made searching must less intrusive and much safer for officers. It has sped up searches and we’ve made sure that the sgt. and both police constables have them.

In fact they’ve been so helpful in reassuring Police officers, being less intrusive during stop and searches and finding things that a finger tip search might not, that I suggested to our Executive member Paul Kyriacou and council Leader Nick Stanton that we had a winning idea and that we should find the money to kit out all frontline Police and enforcement officers in Southwark. That money was finally agreed early January and an order placed.

That order delivered in early March and now all frontline Police and council enforcement officers and our Community Wardens have them.

If you carry guns or knives or needles in Southwark your chance of being caught has been dramatically increased.