Anger over 250+ CCTV cameras (From This Is Local London)

Anger over 250+ CCTV cameras in south Buckinghamshire, Wycombe, South Bucks, Chiltern

9:00am Saturday 19th December 2009 in News By Oliver Evans

Anger over 250+ CCTV cameras

COUNCILS run more than 250 CCTV cameras in south Buckinghamshire, research shows.

Campaign group Big Brother Watch said the 263 cameras were an intrusion of privacy and not effective – but councils said they helped fight crime.

This means there is about 0.8 cameras for every 1,000 people. Eilean Siar in Scotland had the most, 8.3.

The group gathered the figures for UK councils through Freedom of Information Act requests.

The news comes after residents said they wanted less spent on CCTV in a council spending survey.

But Wycombe District Council – which manages all cameras – is pushing ahead with an upgrade of “outdated” equipment (see link, bottom of story).

Alex Deane, director of Big Brother Watch, said: “Local councils across Britain are creating enormous networks of CCTV surveillance at great expense.

“But the evidence for the ability of CCTV to deter or solve crimes is sketchy at best.

“The quality of footage is frequently too poor to be used in courts, the cameras are often turned off to save money and control rooms are rarely manned 24-hours-a-day.”

He said: “With crime on the increase, it is understandable that some people want more CCTV, but we would all feel safer with more police on the beat.”

Some 215 cameras are operated in Wycombe and South Bucks districts and 48 in Chiltern, the figures found.

Latest figures, for January to June, show about 3,700 observations were requested by police for High Wycombe with about 400 arrests and 100 used in court. No convictions data is given (see link at bottom of story).

But Colin Baker, chairman of a lay panel which scrutinises the Bucks system, said: “It is an extremely useful tool. They say it is a cheap alternative to policing but isn’t that a good thing?”

The Dr Who actor said: “It does the job of a policeman. It sees what it is looking at – the same as a policeman.”

He added: “If you are not doing anything wrong then why the heck would you care? You want to stop people committing crimes.”

Councillor Tony Green, deputy leader of WDC, said: “We don’t use it to spy on people. It is a crime detection and prevention system. There is clear evidence that they do help.”

“Fear of crime is much higher than real crime and cameras do help with that.”

And Chiltern District Council’s Noel Brown said: “Our experience is that it seems to make a difference.”