07:20 Thursday 17th May 2012
Peterborough Breakfast Show
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire
“They’re always in groups, and when you’re walking down here late at night, you’re very scared. The amount of cars that have pulled up to me personally, it’s horrible. Would you like to get into my car? How much? It’s a very scary place to live. Very scary.”
“We’re walking down Crown Street now. On the right hand side it backs on to Thistlemoor Road and Balham Road. They have long gardens, around about 100 metres long. I live further down, and it backs on to my property. And we quite often see people running across the gardens to get away from people.”
“My name is Keith Sharp. I’m the ward councillor for North Ward. We’re at the rear of a block of new flats at the top of Crown Street, near Lincoln Road. And there’s an alleyway that goes round the back, that leads to overgrown bushes, cans and rubbish laid about, an ideal site for druggies to come and do their business. As you can see, it’s not looked after at all. People just come here to dump anything. And at night there’s no lighting at all, so it’s an ideal place for them to come and be isolated and out of the way.”
“They’re getting quite clever now. They know if they take it somewhere else and drop it somewhere else, the police will go and look where the needles are dropped. They don’t tend to look in associated places. They go to five or six different sites. They move about, so they’ve got less chance of being caught.”
“It is a nice quiet street during the day. But as soon as it becomes dark, when it’s night-time, that’s when you’ll get gangs of about four to twelve, all standing on every different corner. And if you walk down here at night, then .. I never walk down here alone. I’m a woman. I wouldn’t do it. That’s why I always bring my partner. And he’ll have to walk up with me, because I don’t feel safe walking down here just by myself. I just don’t like living here. There’s nothing I can personally do. So I just guess you’ve got to sit back and let it all happen.”
“It’s something that we’ve been trying to tackle. We’re trying to get confidence into the area. But if we don’t get input from different groups, the Government in particular needs to take this on board. If we don’t start to give the residents something to live up to, then they’re going to talk away. And that’s not good for us.”
“I just don’t like living here. What can I do? I’m looking for the deposit for my own place, because I would much rather be living anywhere else but here.”
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