Anti-social behaviour (ASB)
Contents:
1. What is anti-social behaviour?
2. What the police can do about anti-social behaviour
3. What we can do to help with anti-social behaviour
4. What you can do to help stop anti-social behaviour
1. What is anti-social behaviour?
Anti-social behaviour is when someone does things that scare, upset, or bother other people who don’t live with them. It can make life harder for people living nearby or visiting the area.
Anyone can cause anti-social behaviour if they act in a way that makes others feel worried, annoyed, or unsafe. People who rent homes from us should always behave kindly and respectfully. This means looking after their home, being thoughtful to neighbours, and keeping noise down.
Tenants are also responsible for how their family, guests, and pets behave.
Here are some examples of anti-social behaviour:
- Leaving broken or unwanted cars around
- Dropping rubbish or litter
- Damaging property (vandalism)
- Drawing or writing on walls (graffiti)
- Being noisy or playing loud music
- Using or selling illegal drugs
- Pets making too much noise or behaving badly
2. What the police can do about anti-social behaviour
If you see anti-social behaviour, we encourage you to call the police?or use the?live chat?on the Devon and Cornwall Police website. When you report something, you’ll get a?log or incident number, this helps us and the police decide what to do next.
- If something serious is happening right now and someone is in danger, call?999?straight away.
- If the problem has already happened or it’s not urgent, call?101?or use the police’s?online form?to report it.
3. What we can do to help with anti-social behaviour
If you report a problem to us, we’ll keep it?confidential. That means we won’t tell the person causing the trouble who made the complaint. We may visit or write to them, and we’ll keep you updated or give you advice.
We work with other groups like the police, youth services, and the NHS to try and fix the problem. If the bad behaviour continues, we might take?legal action, especially if the person is a council tenant and breaks the rules of their tenancy, but we always try to solve things peacefully first.
To help us take action, we may ask you to keep a?record of what’s happening, like writing down dates and details of each incident. This helps us build a strong case if we need to go to court.
We can also:
- Use legal powers to stop bad behaviour
- Ask for a court order to stop someone from causing trouble
- Suggest?mediation?to help neighbours talk and solve problems
If someone is playing loud music, we can take action. If the noise is very bad, our?Environmental Health team?can send a warning. If the person ignores it, the team can go to court and take away the equipment causing the noise.
We’ve signed up to the?Respect – ASB Charter for Housing, which means we’re working hard to meet high standards in dealing with anti-social behaviour.
4. What you can do to help stop anti-social behaviour
There are things you can do to help keep your neighbourhood clean, safe, and friendly.
Some actions include:
- If you see litter, graffiti, or cars that look like they’ve been left and forgotten, please tell our?estate management officers.
- You can report these on the?DVLA website.
- If you’re having trouble with a neighbour, it’s often best to talk to them calmly and try to sort things out together. If that doesn’t work, speak to our?estate management team. We’ll look into it and let you know what can be done. You might be asked to fill in a?diary sheet?with dates and times of the problems, which could help if legal action is needed later.
- If the noise happens?outside normal office hours, you can call our?out-of-hours service?on?0330 678 2382. We’ll record your complaint and may send someone to check the noise that night.
- If a pet is causing problems, like barking all the time, it’s usually best to talk to the owner politely. If you’re worried the pet might be dangerous or you don’t feel safe, contact our?estate management team?and we’ll look into it.