Nick Blackburn has been appointed as the BCU Commander across Croydon, Sutton and Bromley, and in his first media interview since landing his new job, he speaks to Inside Croydon
Back in uniform: DCS Nick Blackburn is a career-long Met detective
A Detective Chief Superintendent, Nick Blackburn, has been appointed as the new Borough Commander across Croydon, Sutton and Bromley.
DCS Blackburn replaces Andy Brittain, who after five years in the role was promoted to Temporary Commander at Scotland Yard in February, and now chairs misconduct hearings and gross incompetence meetings.
Blackburn specifically asked to take on the role of Borough Commander or, more formally now that the duties are combined and extended across three south London boroughs, to become the South Area BCU Commander.
Blackburn joined the police in Bexley in 1999, before working as a detective in the Flying Squad and a spell of borough policing in Southwark as a detective sergeant from 2009.
“I have spent the last 13 years in a variety of roles in specialist crime, mostly targeting serious and organised crime, with a focus on homicide, commercial robbery, firearms crime and drug supply networks.
“I am delighted to have been appointed,” DCS Blackburn said of his latest appointment.
Blackburn takes over in Croydon following several years of seriously worrying murder rates in the borough, including some nationally high-profile cases, while the borough is about to be the first place in Britain to have permanently-installed Live Facial Recognition cameras, and when the Met across London is looking to reduce its staff count to meet budget restrictions.
He said, “I have a good team around me and look forward to engaging with local authorities and, of course, the communities within Croydon, working together to prevent and solve crime.”
Croydon went for five years without holding a single meeting of its Safer Neighbourhood Board, the body funded by the Mayor’s Office for Police and Crime, at which police and council liaison is supposed to be discussed in public with residents.
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DCS Blackburn said “I have a good team around me and look forward to engaging with local authorities and, of course, the communities within Croydon, working together to prevent and solve crime.”
Too often today elected and employed individuals have a mindset that they work with each other as they have shared and /or overlapping objectives.
Too often those people they are employed or elected by to provide a service for, are totally ignored and have ”decisions” imposed on them.
I do not infer or believe DCS Blackburn like that. Probably the opposite, but the language used creates a perception right from the outset.
Would it it have been better to put that the other way round – for example like this?
“I have a good team around me and look forward to engaging with the communities within Croydon, Sutton and Bromley, engage with elected representatives and the local authorities to support working together to prevent and solve crimes.”
The three Boroughs together are a big community. Authorities are there to provide a service to those actual communities – not each other as Local authorities first. They are all expected to be working in the public interest and involving those people.
So should not the first priority be to engage with the three local communities?
I can see within Croydon why that could be perceived as a priority to engage with the local authority presiding over civil enforcement matters – there are faults on all sides for that, let not get into blame here.
I would have thought that nothing instills confidence better in local communities suffering from high levels of crime than to be mentioned and addressed first?
I really feel doing so builds trust. To be sought out first to discuss matters that impact on everyday lives which may/would/could include those failures but should focus on solutions first, second and until resolved, would be not just a prioritiy but essential.
Communities are people that live, work, visit, and have come for a new life and to live, work, have families, and grow in safety and also retire live and be cared for safely.
These are people that pay or will pay taxes and vote or will vote. its those that have made the choice to have the services we had and to ensure the rule of law applies equally to everyone . Should that not be the focus and priority?
Even more so when there is a real perception of organisational abandonment within communities. People despair and lose faith in organisaitons, elected representatives locally and nationally and that is not a good recipe for cohesion – that is a breakdown of society.
In Croydon, so many times, civil crimes and anti social behaviours are ignored, and the mutitude of incidents lends to escalation of those ”small misbehaviours” into more serious offenses. Those failures of enforcement are failing everyone.
The consequences impact considerably on the Police, Hospitals, Transport, public utilities, GPs, chemists, . and right back to the council itself, with calls on social services and the people working in the frontline services including the last ones standing in the small enforcement departments after the cuts.
Perhaps its time the special measures and those at the Council noticed their fiscal surgery has left the Borough on life support with only battery back up requiring prepetual recharging.
Yes, there are mistakes at the Council and the Metropolitan Police as organisations, There are also failures within the Community and its people also. After all its not the Council fly tipping, driving along pavements, parking on your front garden or blocking access – oops scratch the last one it probably is in broad green but they have an emergency need most of the time.
Acknowledging and accepting the small (or large) amount of errors and correcting them is required, as is putting in place effective measures that people can rely on when something goes wrong.
That also goes for the Mayor and the CEO of Croydon Council. Perhaps Bromley and Sutton have their issues which may be different from Croydon. They will have their own priorities but again would it not be good to approach them first also?
Finally we did have a meeting this year in Croydon.
It was attended by the Council, the Metropolitan Police the Fire Brigade and there was some interesting speakers also. The exception was the ICB that did not attend or send anyone, which is a pity. A lot of work went into that meeting, it was a lively discussion. lots of reservations and issues raised and some actions to deal with going forward.
With time and effort that can and will grow and lend to new beginnings and rebuild Croydon, perhaps a bit different than it was, but into a safe social and equal opportunity borough, with real social cohesion again, ( including between political parties 🤣🤣) as we used to have between ourselves.
It would be really useful if those taking over did not pull the plug on the hard and difficult work done by those working for the Met in safe neighbourhood teams and especially more meetings like this years at the Town hall. This goes a long way to rebuilding relationships with the community and achieving notable progress.
Finally Andy Brittain had a difficult time over the years and many extraordinary events like Covid and so many s114s that led to deteriorations in the provisions of civil preventions and enforcements and so many of the council services, all of which impacted on Policing in the Borough to an extraordinary degree.
I do wish him the best in his new role – and being very flippant perhaps he may have gained a ton of experience here, which he may find of benefit in his new role?
Engaging with the community has been a disaster – we want our cops to crack down on crime not massage the egos of self-appointed ‘community leaders’. Mind how you go.