CITY BEAT: Kingdom comes to Peterborough

The officers you’ve been seeing or hearing about are from a company called Kingdom. They wear bright blue t-shirts and are here to help us make our city centre clean, safe and enjoyable for visitors, writes Rob Hill, Head of the Prevention and Enforcement Service

At the moment, the council spends £1 million on clearing up litter - that’s money which, let’s be honest, could go on much more worthwhile public services. I don’t think anybody wants see our city centre covered in cigarette butts or crisp packets and I expect nobody wants to get hit by a cyclist whilst getting their weekly dose of retail therapy. So to deal with these issues we have started using enforcement, enforcement in the way of fixed penalty notices of £80, to anyone caught acting in an anti-social way such as littering, spitting and even urinating.

Yes, that’s right, urinating! In fact Kingdom have already issued a ticket to someone doing just that.

So, to make the city a cleaner, safer and more enjoyable place to come, Kingdom have been brought in. This is not to make money or fleece the public. It’s simply to tackle anti-social behaviour and keep our communities safe. Which, I hope you think is a good idea.

And you wouldn’t believe the amount of tickets Kingdom has issued in only three and a half weeks...over 500. So I think you’ll agree that there is a problem in the city centre at the moment and we hope that with Kingdom in sight, littering and unauthorised cycling will soon disappear.

Although we are talking about enforcement and fines being issued, we don’t want anyone in the city to feel worried or scared about Kingdom.

So let’s be clear; If you don’t drop your cigarette butt on the floor you won’t be fined. If you don’t cycle along Bridge Street in the unauthorised hours you won’t be fined. And if you don’t carry out anti-social behaviour by spitting or urinating in public, you won’t be fined. This is about getting hard on those that make our city untidy, dirty and unsafe.

I’d also like to let you know that shortly Kingdom will be moving further afield to areas such as Millfield, New England, Gladstone, Lincoln Road, parts of Eastfield, Central Park, Viersen Platz and the Embankment.

So, my final message to you if you are reading this is; Help us to help you so we can tackle anti-social behaviour and keep our communities safe, cohesive and healthy.