Op Safenight: child safeguarding and spiking advice

Lincolnshire Police worked with partner agencies to guard against child exploitation, raise awareness of spiking and keep our communities safe as part of the latest Op Safenight work over the weekend.

The ongoing proactive initiative sees additional patrols in parts of the city with some of the highest footfall and seeks to keep the city centre safe particularly on Friday and Saturday evenings.

In addition to the work with our partners, we allocate resources to the city centre to help ensure people enjoy themselves safely in the city centre with confidence.

Op Safenight runs on top of our core policing in the city and represents our continued commitment to protecting the public.

Over the weekend we carried out more work as part of the scheme to keep people safe and took the opportunity to raise awareness of Spiking Intensification Week.

We took the following action:

• Our EDDIE display van was used in the city centre (at the junction of Silver Street and High Street) with our PCSOs there, raising awareness of spiking as part of Spiking Intensification Week
• We visited licensed premises to raise awareness of issues of spiking and build on safeguarding around spiking issues and violence against women and girls.
• We visited premises alongside the Childrens’ Society to reinforce the importance of safeguarding against child exploitation in the evening economy.
• Patrols and checks were conducted by taxi licensing officers including the licensing body for Uber operating in the city.
• Conducted joint patrols with police and council ASB officers tackling anti-social behaviour in the city centre. This particularly focused on the enforcement of relevant Criminal Behaviour Orders and of the Public Space Protection Order.
• We also had an increased uniformed policing presence in the City with the assistance of our Special Constables

Chief Inspector Gareth Boxall said: “Our officers worked with other agencies to look at a number of different elements that all contribute to the safety of our city.

“Lincoln is an incredibly safe place to socialise and enjoy an evening out and we want to ensure that it is even safer.

“Some of our work went to raising awareness of those crimes that target women and girls through violence and sexual violence and those that seek to exploit children.

“This joint-agency work underlines our commitment to work together to make Lincoln the safest place to visit.”

Operation Safenight dovetails into a variety of existing schemes and utilises StreetSafe data to help inform where we conduct our work.

The online tool allows people to report areas where they feel unsafe for reasons such as anti-social behaviour, poor street lighting, environmental issues and more.

Data collated from the website gives us the ability to identify areas in need of improvement and act.

We are committed to tackling violence against women and girls (VAWG) and making our county the safest place to live in, work and visit.

For information about the work to tackle VAWG, visit - Violence against women and girls | Lincolnshire Police (lincs.police.uk)