Policing ‘priority areas’ of deprivation

In response to the UK PEEL assessment of 2014 (more information here) West Mercia police force issued a statement which summarised recent developments for the force and area trends. It also notes that 20 policing priority areas are prioritised by the force and have access to extra resources. These were selected using deprivation and other indicators:

“These priority areas have been identified by assessing crime and incident levels, deprivation, partnership feedback and professional judgement.”

This is the first incidence we’ve found of police forces targeting areas using deprivation – please get in touch if you know of any other examples.