Policing Priority Areas

Camberwell Green in Southwark, south London Bristol's Stapleton Road Stoke-on-Trent's Grange Estate; Little Horton and Canterbury in Bradford The West Ward in Rhyl

As Mr Blunkett walked around the housing estate in Bristol, a crowd chanted it was "just a PR stunt".

Protestor Simon Mitchell said: "The police have known about the drug situation and the drug dealing for years and they have chosen to do nothing about it.

"He (David Blunkett) thinks he can use our community as a political football."

But local councillor Robin Moss said: "We need to have a good debate on how to tackle crime in the area, but any extra money and police officers can only be good."

Chief Inspector Dave Forrest of Staffordshire Police said: "By becoming a priority area, we can look at the way services are delivered to the community.

"We are working with the council and the community towards an action plan which will see a joint response to tackling problems on the Grange Estate PPA."

Bradford Metropolitan District Council's Labour Group leader Ian Greenwood, who represents Little Horton, said community policing was already having an effect in the city.

'More conflict'

"We have introduced local police dedicated to particular areas, and this has had a marked effect in reducing crime. We need to build on that good practice.

"People want to see more officers on the street and residents will welcome measures which help tackle crime."

Ian Blair, the Deputy Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, issued a guarded welcome to the new stop and search guidelines.

"Achieving the critical balance between maintaining public confidence in stop and search while seeking to minimise the burden on police officers, will be crucial to the successful implementation of the guidance."

But Glen Smythe, chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, said stop and search had been tried before and did not work.

"It was very corrosive to police/public relations. It caused more conflict than any other single policing operation."

"It will load on to the police service a level of bureaucracy that this government is saying it wants to strip away."