Zero fixed penalty notices issued in first five months of Rushden's PSPO

A Public Space Protection Order (PSPO) was introduced by North Northamptonshire Council (NNC) in March after the town suffered from problems with street drinking, begging and more, giving officers the power to hand people £100 on-the-spot charges for breaching it.

But a recent Freedom of Information request has shown that no FPNs have been issued since the order came into force.

Cllr Jason Smithers (Con), leader NNC, said the authority is now ‘ready to come down hard’ on persistent offenders.

He said: “Rushden has suffered with anti-social behaviour, problems with street drinking, begging and people using the area as a toilet, which is why we got together with the Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner, the police and the town council and introduced the PSPO.

"Since it went live in March this year, our own enforcement officer and police colleagues have established patrolling regimes aiming to root out the trouble makers and those intent on blighting the town.

"Warnings have been given to these individuals in line with our established approach of engage; educate and enforce. The team has started to make a difference with some of those offenders and we can see that with the 17 alcohol seizures so far.

"However, we are now ready to come down hard on those persistent offenders, like we said we’d do when we launched the PSPO, in other words the time has come to start hitting those offenders with formal notices.”

There have been 17 breaches of the PSPO, all of which have been addressed by the police, however no warning letters have been issued.

According to the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014, the PSPO gives the police and the council wider powers to deal with problems which can ‘harm the local community's quality of life.’

The council has taken part in joint patrols of the area with Northants Police, totalling 60 hours so far, with both also committing to their own, separate patrols.