Research on Anti-Social Behaviour
Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC), the independent body which assesses police performance, has asked Ipsos MORI, an independent research agency, to carry out research among members of the public in England and Wales who have reported incidents of anti-social behaviour to the police in the past year. If you have reported anti-social behaviour to Northumbria Police in the past year you may receive, or have received, a telephone call from an Ipsos MORI interviewer inviting you to take part in a short telephone survey.
Hearing your views is the best way to improve the service the police provide to those who report anti-social behaviour. All of your answers to the survey will be completely confidential – neither Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary nor your local police force will know who has taken part. Your details will be used only for the purposes of this research and will not be shared with any other organisation. Participation in the research is completely voluntary.
Some questions & answers
Do I have to take part?
No – taking part is completely voluntary. However, even if the incident you reported was minor, or if the contact you had with the police was brief, we hope you will take part as we are interested in the whole range of people’s experiences.
I don’t remember reporting anti-social behaviour, why have you contacted me?
In some instances people’s contact with the police will have been very limited; perhaps your call was brief, or was made some time ago. Everyone we write to has been listed by the police as having called to report anti-social behaviour.
How did we get your name and address?
Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary has asked your local police force to help us contact individuals who have contacted the police to report anti-social behaviour. Your name was randomly selected from local police records, and passed to Ipsos MORI in confidence. Ipsos MORI will keep your contact details confidential and, once the survey has been completed, will destroy them. Your details are stored securely and will not be passed on to any other research organisations or used for any other surveys. Ipsos MORI fully complies with the Market Research Code of Conduct, details of which can be found at: http://www.mrs.org.uk/standards/codeconduct.htm
I think I’ve already taken part – do you want to speak to me again?
Some local police forces conduct their own surveys and it is possible you have responded to one of these. However, this is different. It is the only national survey which examines the experiences of those who call the police to report anti-social behaviour, and we would like to hear your views regardless of your participation in any other surveys. Similar research was carried out by Ipsos MORI for HMIC in 2010 but it is important that we know how things may have changed since then. The results from the 2010 research can be found here: http://www.hmic.gov.uk/programmes/anti-social-behaviour/