5. What are the Welsh Government’s plans to improve community safety in Ogmore? OQ56855

I thank the Member for that, Llywydd. We work closely with the police and other agencies responsible for community safety in Ogmore. Later this week my colleague the Minister for Social Justice, Jane Hutt, will chair the policing partnership board for Wales, where community safety matters are always on the agenda.

I thank the First Minister for that answer, and one of the things that gave me greatest pleasure over a decade ago was being part of the committee in Westminster that brought into being the police community support officers. It was a long, arduous committee, but we brought them in, and we brought them in because we knew the role that they would have in tackling low-level nuisance and antisocial behaviour, in releasing police resources to focus on other priorities, and to engage with the community, youth groups and other groups in the community as well. So, it also gives me great pleasure, I have to say, to come down here to the Senedd and find successive Welsh Labour Governments investing in police community support officers.

Could you give us the assurance, the guarantee, that both in this Senedd—as a manifesto commitment, making good on it—but also going forward, that Welsh Labour will continue to invest in PCSOs as part of that extended reach of the policing family, and making sure that our communities are as safe as can possibly be, and that we extend deep into these communities to engage with them on community safety?

Llywydd, I was very pleased indeed in August to be able to go to Neath with the local police and crime commissioner and with Jane Hutt to announce that we had already found the money to fulfil that manifesto commitment. So, an extra 100 PCSOs are being recruited now. They will cost £3.7 million annually. That will take the total investment by the Welsh Government to £22 million each year and that will secure the services of 600 PCSOs across Wales. I entirely agree with what Huw Irranca-Davies has said, Llywydd: I've had the good fortune to talk to a whole series of police and community support officers, and they really are problem-solving people, out there on the front line. Whether that's engaging with young people, whether it's dealing with traffic outside schools, whether it is responding to mental health needs as people see them on the streets, they are there working with those local communities to solve the problems. That is why this Government has chosen to invest in them. It was a proposal very warmly welcomed earlier this year, and I look forward to seeing that investment continue.

I want to declare an interest as I am an elected councillor of Bridgend County Borough Council. First Minister, in July it was reported that the police were planning to use powers to crack down on anti-social behaviour at Ogmore-by-Sea using a dispersal order. Will the First Minister outline how successful this measure has been, and if it has worked, whether he believes that other hotspots could benefit? Thank you very much.

Llywydd, I think it is more for the police and their partners on the ground to be able to report on the success of their initiatives in any locality, rather than for me. What I do know is that, ever since May of this year, a weekly meeting has taken place, led by local police services but involving all blue-light partners. In the Ogmore setting, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, the British Transport Police and others review all the evidence of activity over the previous weekend, they look forward to events that are happening over the week ahead, and they try and align their resources to respond to those local community needs. That is why that neighbourhood policing, in which PCSOs play such a part, is able to respond to issues when there is a need to mobilise resources in the way that Altaf Hussain referred to in the Ogmore context.