New national accreditation for Business Crime Reduction Partnerships will give local Forces greater ‘confidence’ when supporting businesses

It came at a meeting organised by Revive & Thrive, one of only two of the scheme’s authorised Assessing Organisations.

Addressing a group of assessors who are interested in being involved in the new standard, Mark Barnes, Managing Director of Powys-based management company, Revive & Thrive, said embracing accreditation would help BCRPs keep town and city centres safe around the UK.

It would encourage them to ‘raise their game’ as well as help instil confidence in sharing information and partnership working, particularly with the local Police Constabularies.

PCPI, the national police crime prevention initiative, which is often referred to by its most successful initiative, Secured by Design, announced this month (October) it had become the accreditation body for BCRPs based on a set of standards owned by the National Business Crime Centre.

Revive & Thrive specialises in sharing best management practice in partnership working in town and city centres and high streets, and most recently, industrial estates and shopping centres. Its work includes Business Improvement Districts, Town Centre Partnerships, Town Teams and now BCRPs or similar.

At the Revive & Thrive ‘Assessor Inaugural Meeting’ at the town centre offices of Somerset District Council, Yeovil, on Wednesday, 17 October, Mark said they were keen to work with new and long-established BCRPs around the UK to adopt the new online assessment process and accreditation standard.

“We want to help people up their game and be accredited under the new structure. We are good at making things happen and we are good to go live with this scheme,” said Mark, who is also a Powys county councillor.

Revive & Thrive’s Director of Business Crime Reduction, Andrew Sharman, explained that the previous accreditation system – Safer Business Award – was administered through only a single Assessing Organisation and had received only limited response from BCRPs, with, for example, only three accredited schemes in the entire South West of England.

Having a single Assessing Organisation gave traders an opt out, whether for budget or other reasons, and that led to a lack of police confidence and engagement with schemes without accreditation, he said. Now there are two Assessing Organisations and a more open playing field to work with BCRPs to the new NBCC standard.

Andrew told the meeting: “I’m very much on board with it – this is something I’ve been wanting to see for the last ten years. The fact that PCPI, which works on behalf of Police Forces around the country, has taken this on, is really reassuring for partners and organisations and given it that extra credence needed to take it forward.”

He explained why accrediting BCRPs is important: “Fundamentally, if you don’t have a safe and secure town centre people will not come. You need to have compliant data sharing and you need to have good functioning partnerships between traders, the BCRP, the Business Improvement District (BID), and the local Constabulary.

“To be able to have an Assessing Organisation with a strategic overview, to ensure the role is being carried out in a compliant fashion, and to ensure it has an effective partnership working model, is important. That is what Revive & Thrive will be taking forward.

“Coupled with that, what PCPI will be doing in verifying our work as an Assessing Organisation, is really important too, to give communities confidence and reduce business crime.”

Andrew added: “Constabularies now want to see every scheme assessed and accredited because it will give them that confidence to share information with them,” he said.

At the meeting, the assessors were talked through each of the five category standards – from systems and procedures, governance, and data integrity through to communications, and benefits and objectives – with supporting comments from a representative of Yeovil’s town centre safety partnership.

Although Revive & Thrive has a network of professionals working in this sector, it is looking to expand its team of assessors and wants to hear from professionals who have experience in the police and crime reduction, retail and business or partnership working.

For further information about Revive & Thrive and its conference and training events in May 2019 contact:
Tel: 03330 124285
Email:
Web: www.reviveandthrive.co.uk