Police provide public access to local confidence survey results

Sussex Police has launched a new website feature, providing the public with an "access all areas" pass to find out about confidence in local policing in their area.

As part of a national initiative, people across Sussex were contacted by telephone and asked a question from the British Crime Survey; whether they agreed that: “The police and local council are dealing with the anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in this area”.

The survey found that over 7 people out of 10 across Sussex agreed that Sussex Police and their local council are dealing with those issues that matter the most to their communities. To view the results for each district visit www.sussex.police.uk/localconfidence.

Deputy Chief Constable Giles York said: "We are pleased to provide the public with open access to these results, which highlights our commitment to transparency across the force. This demonstrates how the police and local council work with the public to tackle anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter most to them."

"We will continue to serve Sussex, keeping it a safe place to live, work and visit."

Chairman of Sussex Police Authority, Dr Laurie Bush, said: "The Authority welcomes the findings of these local confidence surveys and we are pleased to see the information firmly in the public domain. These results are a positive step towards achieving the Single Confidence Target set by the Home Office and we must continue to learn from them and Sussex Police must strive to improve these results even further. Sussex Police Authority will be scrutinising these and further efforts in this area."

The Home Office will publish the results of all Forces during the first week of March.

The Government has set all police forces a single target to raise public confidence that the police and local council are dealing with the anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter locally. Care should be taken in making comparisons in local indicators that have used different survey techniques.

The survey is based on a random sample of people in the local area, with a booster quota sample of “top-up” responses. The use of a random sample with a quota booster sample seeks to ensure the results are broadly representative of the local population. Quota samples may, however, inadvertently introduce unknown sources of statistical bias.

Those surveyed were asked to answer in one of the following ways: "Strongly Agree", "Tend to Agree", "Neither Agree or Disagree", "Tend to Disagree", "Strongly Disagree" or "Don’t Know".

The published results are presented as the percentage of respondents agreeing that the police and local council are dealing with the anti social behaviour and crime issues that matter in this area. This percentage is calculated by summing up the “Strongly Agree” and “Tend to Agree” categories and expressing this sum as the percentage of the total number of responses (i.e. the sum of the six response categories.