STUDENTS HELP POLICE LAUNCH NEW SAFETY CAMPAIGN

On Tuesday 22 September, GMP unveiled a new safety campaign, designed by students for students.

The campaign focuses on robbery and burglary, the two crimes that students are most likely to become victims of, after statistics showed that over the last three years, more than 18,000 students became victims of crime within the city of Manchester.

"Every year, we run a safety campaign aimed at providing students with advice to prevent them becoming a victim of crime. However, for new students in particular, crime prevention is always going to be the last thing on their minds when they're leaving home for the first time and they're likely to think it will never happen to me.

"This year, we have taken a new approach and have enlisted the help of a group of design students from Manchester Metropolitan University to devise a marketing campaign. We hope that because it has been designed by students, it will make other students stop, think and ultimately take steps to protect themselves and what they own," said: Superintendent Simon Barraclough from GMP's South Manchester Division.

Helen Butterworth, one of the design students added: "As we are the target audience, we thought a fresh, exciting and vibrant approach would attract the attention of the student population. With the simple, cheeky and thought provoking straplines, we wanted to give the campaign a sense of fun while still communicating the serious crime prevention messages.

"Overall, we hope that our fellow students will take note and 'protect themselves and what they own' by taking some very simple steps."

The marketing campaign will run alongside various policing operations that will be in place to keep new and returning students safe. These will include: high-visibility patrols in hotspot areas at key times; intelligence gathering; targeting known offenders; and live monitoring of CCTV cameras.

In addition, police officers will be holding safety talks at all halls of residences that are attached to the University of Manchester, Manchester Metropolitan University and Royal Northern College of Music. The talks will welcome freshers and will urge them to become more security savvy.

Superintendent Simon Barraclough continued: "Manchester is a great city for students to study, live and socialise. Our job is to make sure that their experience is as safe and enjoyable as possible and we are committed to doing this.

"However, the number of students falling victim to crime is still far too high. To stop this we need students to follow some very simple steps. It is really easy to make it hard for thieves by doing straightforward things, such as keeping valuables out of sight, always being aware of what's going on around you, keeping to well-lit areas and shutting and locking all your windows and doors even when you're at home."

Students are also encouraged to register their valuables on www.immobilise.com It's a quick, easy and free way of logging the details of your property on a national database that police can access and compare against items that have been found or recovered from suspected criminals.

For more advice on keeping safe, students can log on to:
www.mcrstudentsafer.com