Police target junction for begging after people spoken to 'dozens of times'
Police have spoken to homeless people "dozens of times" over the last eight months as part of efforts to stop begging at a specific junction.
Greater Manchester Police (GMP) said that the Bolton neighbourhood team has been taking a direct and targeted approach to vulnerable people.
They said they regularly patrol areas where they are known to visit or pass through, and provide them with checks and signpost those in need.
Police have focused efforts on the area where the A666 meets Topp Way, as many people have reported begging in the area.
This includes on the streets and at traffic lights.
Officers can signpost homeless people to support services offered by the local authority, charities and partners.
However, they can also issue out punishments when needed.
The first is usually a community protection warning, which tells people to change their behaviour if it is causing problems in the area.
Have a story? Get in touch at eoin.mccaul@newsquest.co.uk
If they still do not change their behaviour, a community protection notice can then be given - which can lead to a criminal behaviour order.
Both provide specifications for the recipient to follow.
Prosecution is an option for the last resort, if none of the notices or orders have been obeyed.
READ MORE: Man and woman charged after attack on teenager in Heaton
READ MORE: Police find body in search for 28-year-old missing Leigh man
READ MORE: Jack Naylor found guilty of murdering Thomas Gomm in Boothstown attack
Sergeant Zach Keneally, from GMP's Bolton Neighbourhood Team, said: 'We work incredibly closely with our local partners to ensure that those who need help in our communities get the assistance they need.
'While we will always first seek to engage and support, we will never hesitate to take the appropriate action when criminal offences are committed and it the right course of action.
'Ultimately, we are there to serve Bolton in multiple ways, and engagement and support for those who may be vulnerable or at risk of falling into crime is a key part of ongoing prevention work.'
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Community heartbreak after human remains discovered
Loved ones and community members have been left heartbroken after human remains were discovered during the ongoing search for 23-year-old Joshua Bishop. Officers executed a search warrant at a home in the quiet suburb of Westmeadows, northwest of Melbourne, on Saturday, where they made the grim discovery and arrested a man. While the remains are yet to be formally identified, in the hours following the discovery, a close friend, who had organised a fundraiser on behalf of the family, provided an update. The family had been fiercely searching for Mr Bishop who was last seen by his housemate on Lalor Crescent in Sunbury, in the city's northwest, on May 27. "With the heaviest hearts, we share that our beloved Joshua Bishop has been found — but sadly, not in the way we had hoped. We are devastated and struggling to find the words," Daniel De Vivero wrote. "Your incredible support, generosity, and compassion throughout this heartbreaking time have meant more than we can express. The Bishop family has felt truly surrounded by love through every moment of this journey." "Rest in peace, Josh. You are deeply loved, and you will never be forgotten." Mr Bishop was reported missing on May 29 by his mother, after he failed to access his phone or bank accounts. Weeks after his disappearance, his parents made an emotional plea for their son's return, urging anyone with information to come forward. They described his disappearance as completely out of character. The home on Erinbank Crescent, where the remains were found, is just kilometres from Broadmeadows Valley Park, where Mr Bishop's phone had last been traced. Detectives arrested a 27-year-old Westmeadows man, who is expected to be interviewed in relation to the remains. Their investigation remains ongoing.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
If Zohran Mamdani is the future of the Democrats, they're doomed
It would be easy to call San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie the 'anti-Zohran Mamandi,' but that would fail to do the first-term leader justice. Sworn into office this past January, Lurie – like Mamdani – hails from a storied family, in this case the founders of the Levi Strauss denim dynasty. But that is where the similarities end. Lurie was elected to City Hall last November following nearly a decade of decay across San Francisco. Fuelled by the soft-on-crime policies of former district attorney Chesa Boudin, San Francisco – an urban jewel of technology and wealth – was close to becoming a failed state. Violent crime, open-air drug camps, hundreds of annual drug overdose deaths, a declining population base and desolate downtown plagued the city where I was born and raised. San Francisco's ills were akin to many large American urban centres: Philadelphia with its gruesome 'Tranq' crisis; the epidemic of deadly violent crime devastating Chicago. And, of course, Los Angeles – similarly battling an inhospitable mix of homelessness, drugs and criminality. But sized a mere 49 square miles (one-tenth that of Los Angeles), San Francisco's blight has felt uniquely acute and everywhere – all at the same time. Back in 2022, fed up voters ousted district attorney Boudin, whose laissez-faire prosecutorial approach directly led to the city's spiralling quality of life. Former San Francisco mayor London Breed attempted, honourably, to steer San Francisco back to sanity. But with a record 806 drug-related deaths in 2023 alone – and San Francisco's abandoned business core dubbed a 'ghost town' by major media – Breed lost to Lurie last November. Despite a lack of formal political experience, Lurie is hardly new to politics. His career has been shaped by public service, mostly leading large non-profits focused on tackling urban ills – often in association with scions of other local family dynasties. Lurie's flagship $500 million Tipping Point Community organisation, for instance, was established alongside the daughter of Financial Services billionaire Charles Schwab. The reliance on – rather than rejection of – the private sector for public good has been a key Lurie manoeuvre and stands in sharp contrast to Mamdani's platform. Indeed, much like former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg a decade ago, Lurie has tapped major corporations and philanthropists to fund ambitious city programs hit hard by San Francisco's $800 million budget deficit. Earlier this month, for instance, he set up an entire department, the San Francisco Downtown Development Corporation, to steer private funding to city projects. Lurie has also heavily leaned into San Francisco's abundance of visionary innovators, most notably – and understandably – in the tech world. OpenAI head Sam Altman helped lead Lurie's transition team after his election last year. Such schemes – and there are many – stand in sharp contrast to the economic expansion plan touted by Mamdani, which mostly relies on added taxes levied on New York's wealthiest residents and corporations. And not just any wealthy residents and corporations: Mamdani's own website describes his strategy as shifting 'the tax burden from overtaxed homeowners in the outer boroughs to more expensive homes in richer and whiter neighbourhoods.' Such taxes would then be used to pay for low cost basic services including housing, transport and child care, even groceries. In other words – DEI meets Socialism. If this is the future of the Democrats, they are doomed. The problem with Mamdani's plans is that they rarely benefit – or are even desired – by those for whom they are designed. How else to explain the mostly white, mostly affluent New Yorkers who voted for Mamdani this week. Poor people don't need cheap housing – they need quality housing. They don't want free subway services, but reliable – and never more so – safe public transport. This requires funding, which taxes would supply, but also know-how, supply chains, available workforces and long-term commitments. And these are best delivered by partnering with the private sector. Earlier this month, for instance, crypto billionaire Chris Larsen gave $9.4 million to fund a Real Time Investigation Centre for the SFPD. Investment in law enforcement is another key area where Mamdani could learn from Lurie. Last month the mayor announced that the SFPD would be spared the 15 per cent budget cut he's implementing across city departments. Lurie has also signed an executive order to add 500 police officers to the department by, among other strategies, re-hiring recently retired officers. Lurie's law-and-order focus appears to be working: this week the SFPD made 97 arrests in a single day in San Francisco drug dens – 'the largest one-day fugitive-focused enforcement in recent history,' according to the city. While Lurie boosts officer numbers in San Francisco, Mandani has pledged to slash them. In their place, he will create a Department of Community Safety that relies on social-service schemes – 'evidence-based strategies that prevent violence and crime before they occur,' as he has described it – to maintain public order. This is a city that has finally seen a decrease in spiralling violent crime numbers – precisely because of an increase in police patrols. In 2023, for instance, New York City experienced a 20 per cent rise in arrests, a five-year record according to NYPD Chief John Chell. San Francisco may be far smaller than New York City, but its challenges – rising costs, a decreasing tax base, middle- and upper-class population declines – are eerily similar. Five years after Covid decimated both cities' business bases, mayor Lurie appears to understand that fixing San Francisco requires, above all else, public safety and a robust private-sector. Zohran Mandani should pay attention. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
UK considers envoy for Britons held abroad
Britain is preparing to emulate the United States by appointing an envoy tasked with freeing citizens arbitrarily detained abroad, as it faces calls to do more to bring them home. High-profile cases like jailed Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abdel Fattah and imprisoned Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai have spotlighted the plight of Britons held in jails overseas. The UK foreign ministry insists it continues to press such cases with governments, but relatives of detainees and human rights organisations complain of a lack of urgency and transparency. "The government is committed to strengthening support for British nationals, including through the appointment of a new envoy," a Foreign Office spokesperson told AFP. Middle East Minister Hamish Falconer has said an "Envoy for Complex Consular Detentions" is expected to be appointed "before the summer". The government has not specified the terms of the role but it could be similar to America's Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs, a position created in 2015. Unlike the United States though, Britain does not take part in prisoner exchanges. Professor Carla Ferstman, an expert on arbitrary detentions at the Human Rights Centre at Essex Law School, said appointing someone would be the "clearest thing that the UK can do that it hasn't done yet". "When you have someone at the highest level they command a certain level of respect," she told AFP. Abdel Fattah was arrested in September 2019 and sentenced to five years in prison on charges of "spreading false news" after sharing a Facebook post about police brutality. He is still imprisoned despite a hunger strike by his mother and Britain's foreign ministry saying it is pushing for his release "at the highest levels of the Egyptian government". His sister Sanaa Seif said an envoy would mean "a proper continued focus on" freeing detainees. - 'Clear strategy' - "It's also important to have a focal point that can help coordinate between different government bodies so that they all work in synchronisation," she told AFP. Seif believes the government should consider revising travel advice to Egypt too, a call also made by lawmakers who have suggested the government should sanction Egyptian officials as well. "Is it not clear that words are no longer sufficient?" Conservative peer Guy Black asked in parliament's House of Lords recently. Ferstman said tightening travel guidance can be a powerful tool. "It's a big deal because all of a sudden tourists can't get insurance and it's harder for business travel to happen. There's all kinds of implications," she explained. Amnesty International recently called for the government to develop a "clear strategy" to support arbitrarily detained Britons, including by demanding that UK officials attend trials. The Labour government pledged in its general election-winning manifesto last year that it would introduce "a new right to consular assistance in cases of human rights violations". Amnesty also wants the government to call for a person's "immediate release", including publicly when it is requested by the family. It said London took three years to publicly call for Lai to be freed, something his son Sebastian said "sends the wrong message" to "autocratic states". "The quicker we have the government speak out post-arrest, that's the window of opportunity to have people released," Eilidh Macpherson, Amnesty's campaigns manager for individuals at risk told AFP. UK officials say the government can be wary of accusations it is interfering in another country's judicial system. "Sometimes it may need to be quiet about what it's doing, but this shouldn't come at the expense of transparency," said Ferstman. Jagtar Singh Johal, a Sikh blogger from Scotland, was arrested in India in November 2017 while there for his wedding on accusations of being part of a terror plot against right-wing Hindu leaders. He has not been convicted of a crime and in March was cleared in one of the nine charges against him. The foreign ministry spokesperson said Foreign Secretary David Lammy "continues to raise concerns" about the detention with India's government "at every appropriate opportunity". But his brother, Gurpreet Singh Johal complains of being kept in the dark. "We don't know what's actually being said," he told AFP. Gurpreet said an envoy would be a "good thing" but until the position is in place, "We won't know exactly what it means." pdh/jwp/ach
