An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure.

We must all be concerned at the recent spate of house burglaries hitting Southampton, and Hampshire more widely.

The question is what can be done about it?

Naturally, people’s first thought is for “more police on our streets”, assuming a police officer will be permanently on guard outside every property and business in our community. This of course is not possible and indeed never has been.

The fact is there are far fewer house burglaries today than 20 years ago; about 3650 last year compared to around 16000 in the late 1990’s. Well you might say, there were more officers then! Actually no, there are about the same number of officers now as there were back then. Houses and cars are more secure today and we are more aware of the need to lock doors and hide our valuables.

I suspect the burglaries we’re experiencing at the moment are related to feeding a drugs habit, cash taken or items stolen that can be easily sold to buy drugs. The need of an addict for cash, to either buy their drug or pay a debt to a dealer, is so strong that the risks of being caught is worth taking to get that drug or pay a drug debt and so remove the threat of violence associate with debt collections in the drugs world.

Policing today is more complex than even it was 20 years ago. Increasingly crimes that affect society and our day-to-day security are “hidden”, happening but not visible to most of us, and are tackled by policing that we don’t see, online theft, child sexual exploitation, financial fraud, human trafficking and identity theft to name only a few.

Modern policing needs to balance the requirement to tackle these “hidden” crimes, which if allowed to take hold would bring havoc and misery across society, and the public’s feeling of safety at seeing a visible police on our streets.

An ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure. Society must intervene early to stop offending of all types and address the social problems we face today. Hampshire Constabulary once effectively deterred organised drug criminals coming to our county, it was called Operation Fortress. As with many initiatives, it was downgraded as part of budget cuts – a false economy in my view, as I expressed to our current and previous Chief Constables.

It’s reported to me that the availability of drugs on our streets is on the increase. I believe the increase in theft and violence we are now seeing is a result of the drug trade creeping back into Hampshire.

We need to fund both increased police capability and effective drug treatment for those addicted who have nowhere to turn – a short-term financial investment, but along term gain in reducing crimes related to drug addiction.