New laws include powers to break up gangs

Shoplifters, aggressive beggars and rowdy youths will be among those targeted in the clampdown.

Those behind the scheme, which is backed by the city council, said it would cut crime and increase safety.

But opponents warned that the tactic would simply move the problem somewhere else and not tackle its root causes.

MSPs passed the Anti-social Behaviour Bill, which includes controversial powers to break up gangs, last month.

CCTV network

In co-operation with Glasgow City Council, a partnership of 200 shop owners aims to start pursuing exclusion orders against specific individuals from next month.

When a court grants a banning order, the police will now have the power to arrest someone merely for entering the city centre.

Glasgow already has a radio and CCTV network aimed at combating street crime and is looking to develop a database of known criminals.

The initiative's programme manager Willie Caie said that they already knew the identities of the "small minority" of people who caused problems.

It reduces crime and helps to increase the safety of the people using the city Willie Caie Programme manager

He said they could track their movements through the city centre, and that the new legislation would be another element in their efforts to exclude them from the area.

"The Anti-social Behaviour Bill will allow us to turn that information that we have into information that we can present to a court to prevent people accessing the city," he said.

"It is extremely popular and well used in England and Wales. It reduces crime and helps to increase the safety of the people using the city."

He said those targeted would include prolific shoplifters and people who were violent or used aggressive behaviour.

Hamish Millar, the manager of the Buchanan Galleries shopping centre, said there was also a problem with aggressive beggars.

He added that retail-related crime accounted for about half the crime in the city centre.

Rosie Kane: A "cosmetic" clean-up

"That is a significant effect on the businesses that really prop up the economy and it costs individual customers about �100 a year," he said.

However, Scottish Socialist MSP Rosie Kane said the move would only lead to a "cosmetic" clean-up of the city centre - without tackling the causes.

"If the underlying problems that are leading to the crime are still there then the crime will surely exist in the peripheral areas.

"We will have done nothing to deal with the problem or the crime," she said.

Her view was shared by the Big Issue's Mel Young, the president of the International Network of Street Papers.

He said that excluding people from the city centre would simply move the problem somewhere else.

Long-term... it does not work because people move to other parts of the area Mel Young Big Issue

"The solution really is to have a look at what is causing the problem, look at the roots of the problem then solve the problem," he said.

"Evidence from other parts of the world indicates that in the short term it can be very successful.

"Long-term, however, it does not work because people move to other parts of the area, and that has been shown in parts of France and America."

But Mr Caie said evidence from England suggested that exclusion orders had an impact on people's lifestyle and could change their behaviour.