Crime

• Council left with £80k bill to clean up four abandoned trailers

  Four 40ft articulated trailers containing rubbish have been dumped in Bromley, costing the council more than £80,000 to deal with.

  

• Council gang prevention programme gets £800,000 boost

  Waltham Forest Council has allocated an additional £806,000 of funding over four years in order to ‘reshape’ its gang prevention programme.

  

• Whitehall announces ‘co-ordinated’ approach to fighting terrorism

  The Government’s updated counter-terrorism strategy will include closer cooperation with local authorities, Sajid Javid says.

  

• Church launches anti-slavery app

  Council chiefs have endorsed a new app designed to help gather information about modern slavery in car washes.

  

• Council fights thieves by ‘armour-plating’ parking meters

  Leicester City Council has been forced to armour-plate its parking meters to discourage thieves.

  

• Council secures conviction over ‘mass destruction’ of protected trees

  Borough of Poole has successfully prosecuted a man after he illegally chopped down 11 protected trees in the garden of his property.

  

• Whitehall launches £40m strategy to fight violent crime

  The Government today launched a multi-million pound strategy to tackle the ‘root causes’ of violent crime, including a task force involving local authorities.

  

• The harassment and intimidation of local councillors

  From death threats to online harassment, just why are councillors subject to increasing levels of abuse? Neil Merrick investigates.

  

• British citizens ‘largest nationality’ recorded in slavery figures

  British citizens are for the first time the largest nationality recorded as potential victims in the national trafficking and modern slavery figures.

  

• Council employee exploited systems ‘failures’ to steal £1m

  Failures in ‘fundamental controls’ within Dundee City Council’s financial systems allowed a former employee to steal £1m from the authority, auditors conclude.