In an attempt to turn the fine words of Bournemouth Council into real action, the Conservatives are pressing the ruling Lib Dems to put their money where their mouths are and provide some leadership in tackling binge drinking and antisocial behaviour.

This week the Conservatives supported moves by Independent Cllr Ron Whittaker to give the measures some teeth but the Lib Dem Council somehow managed to turn his good intentions into a political argument and decided to do nothing - in other words they rejected need for stronger measures and denied that extra resources from the Council might help the hard-pressed police to tackle the problem.

Those who live in the real world and see the extreme elements and worst behaviour of the nighttime economy are now even more frustrated by this deliberate attempt to avoid any responsibility for leadership in tackling the problem which is getting worse by the week.

Fine words continue to pour out of the Town Hall but they are never followed up by anything practical and so the police are left to fight the problem on their own. When it comes down to actually doing something about antisocial behaviour, the Lib Dems are nowhere to be seen - in parliament they consistently voted against the introduction of ASBOs - orders that would help stop those who make others' lives a misery.

Leader of the Conservatives on Bournemouth Council, Cllr Stephen MacLoughlin said, 'The Lib Dems have shown their true colours yet again - if they were serious about tackling binge drinking and antisocial crime they would have welcomed the move and voted for it. Instead all we heard was more talk and reasons for doing nothing.'

He continued, 'People shouldn't be surprised by this - for example, nationally the Lib Dems don't believe that first time burglars (that is, burglars actually caught for the first time) should be sent to prison but they think that those in prison should be given the vote - the Lib Dems are soft on crime.'

Central Ward Cllr David Smith said, 'What we want is a clear commitment by the Lib Dems to start spending some money on CCTV instead of running it down - it's what everybody keeps telling me they want to see and it should be the Council's first priority.' He added, 'What we asked the Lib Dems to do was to investigate how we can get the various drinking establishments in the town centre to pay towards the extra policing and cleanup costs caused by their customers - they rejected this suggestion out of hand and decided to do nothing. Law and order will never improve if the Council allow things to carry on as they are and don't start to show some proper leadership.'

The Lib Dems seem to be complacent in the extreme about the scale of drink fuelled crime in today's Bournemouth - it has become much worse recently but they simply do not recognise the facts. With 24 hour licensing just about to start, the Conservatives want to see strong action in support of the police and will continue to press the Lib Dems to make it Bournemouth Council's number one priority.

For further details please contact:-

Cllr John Beesley
Bournemouth Conservatives
on Bournemouth Council

Tel. 01202 762403
Mobile 07860 391219
email john.beesley@bournemouth.gov.uk