Are you a hands-on President or is it more of an honorary role?
To some extent it's an honorary title but it does come with responsibilities. And it's a responsibility that I take extremely seriously because I am incredibly honoured to be the President.
I have got an ambassadorial role and I think that it's important to be the public face of the charity. And I also think it is part of my role to champion the charity and the good work that it does in London. I'd also like to think that I am available as an independent adviser to assist the charity as it goes from strength to strength. So I think it is more than just an honorary role.
Are you trying to increase the funding available to the Safer London Foundation?
We're always trying to find more income streams to increase our budget across all areas of our responsibilities. I know that money is always a problem and money is a particular problem at this moment in time of course. Raising money for charity at this moment in time is always very tough.
But we shouldn't forget that over two years the Safer London Foundation (SLF) has made more than £1.8m of grants to projects across every London borough. That is not an insignificant amount of money and it will have done a huge amount of good.
These projects are examples of ordinary people doing extraordinary things...
London is full of heroes. There are so many heroes, including among our kids who are often spoken about as a crime problem when more often than not the reverse is true. London is full of heroes many of whom give up their own time and do fantastic work. We should be celebrating them, of course we should.
... But the very fact that such grassroots organisations need to exist is indicative of serious failings in society, isn't it?
It could be but I wouldn't say that is the case. No matter how good our society gets, or how good it is, we will always want voluntary sector. The voluntary sector has always played a huge role in British public life and long may that continue because it is something more than just people doing additional work. It is about the whole civic pride of our nation.
How important are the Safer Neighbourhood Teams to your policing strategy in London?
They are hugely important. They have been the gold standard for some considerable amount of time. We see them as massively important in ensuring that we engage and stay engaged with the public who are paying our wage, and the public deserve to be confident that we are on their side in doing their bidding.
From feedback from the Safer Neighbourhood Teams, what are the issues that Londoners are most worried about?
It differs from team to team. Whilst we might see some of the high end crime as major issues and we see some of the headlines, particularly around youth violence, actually people remain concerned about very often low-level anti-social behaviour and that is sometimes not necessarily violence on the streets but the perception of it. It is very much about concentrating locally on what matters to people and low level anti-social behaviour for many communities in London.
So they're here to stay? There was some controversy about how much they were costing when Safer Neighbourhood Teams were first introduced.
We are fully committed to maintaining the Safer Neighbourhood Teams. We are of course concerned of the amount of abstraction that we are having to make from borough policing generally to police some of the high-level events such as G20 and of course the ongoing Tamil protesting Parliament Square.
That is a concern of mine because I think whatever the rights and wrongs of that demonstration that is a huge cost to people in London and I want the cops of London to be on the streets of London policing their concerns.
Has the trust and relationship between police and the public been weakened in the aftermath of the G20 protests?
Do I expect there to be any potential issues for confidence in policing? Then, yes, of course I do. They are concerns of mine. But the reality is that the Safer Neighbourhood Teams were there before G20 and they are still there now. They are doing the same work and they will get the respect and the support of communities because they are out there doing their bidding. This is a long-term commitment; this isn't a sprint, this is a marathon.
You've been in the job a few months now, enjoying it?
Absolutely. It's been a little tricky on a number of occasions but then again when I took the job I never imagined that it would be anything less than challenging. If I hadn't of imagined that then I would have been a rather foolish new Commissioner.
