Northamptonshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner Stephen Mold has been successful in a bid to the Home Office and awarded £432,000 to fund crime fighting projects in Wellingborough after a successful bid to round two of the Safer Streets initiative.

The funding will be used in a major scheme to make hundreds of homes on the Hemmingwell estate in Wellingborough more secure. Working with the local housing provider Greatwell Homes, the Hemmingwell Safer Streets scheme will enhance CCTV on the estate, as well as providing new front doors to make properties less vulnerable.

The project will begin during the summer and will be completed by the end of March 2022.

The Home Office Safer Streets fund enables Police and Crime Commissioners and local authorities to bid for funding to support crime prevention initiatives in areas particularly affected by acquisitive crime such as burglary, vehicle crime and robbery.

The funding must go towards measures that are proven to cut crime, including changes to the street scene such as locked alley gates and better lighting, and the installation of CCTV.

Northamptonshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner was awarded the maximum amount available for any one bid and PFCC Stephen Mold has said that he will add additional funding from his budget, as well as funding from partners North Northamptonshire Council and Greatwell Homes, to ensure that further enhancements to community safety on the Hemmingwell estate can be carried out.

Today’s (June 3) funding award is the second time that Northamptonshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner has been successful in the Safer Streets Fund. Last July, funding was awarded for three schemes that have just been successfully completed:

• Security improvements to car parks, and new, safe bike parking facilities and safety enhancements to hundreds of homes on the Bouverie estate and Portland Place in Northampton. The town’s CCTV system was also enhanced with the addition of 13 new state-of-the-art cameras

• The gating of alleyways behind homes in Wellingborough, with 74 gates making properties in the Victoria area more secure from crime and a significant extension of the town centre CCTV system with the addition of seven new cameras

• 18 alley gates to secure the rear of homes in Kettering, where the town’s CCTV system was extended, with 15 new cameras to cover the All Saints area

Northamptonshire Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner Stephen Mold said: “I am thrilled that we have been successful, yet again, in securing additional funding to make people in Northamptonshire safer.

“The three projects we have already carried out using Safer Streets funding made real improvements that made people in Kettering, Wellingborough and Northampton safer in their homes. Residents in those areas have told me that the schemes have made such a difference to them and I know that these crime fighting measures have a lasting impact on people’s lives. I can’t wait to get started on the Hemmingwell estate.”