PM Gordon Brown recently called for major change to promote greater trust and scrutiny in the process of government.

We need to do the same at a local level, if we are to successfully face the challenges in how we respond to both the ‘War on terror' and the wider issue of creating successful and safe communities.

Neighbourhood Policing (NHP) is one way to address these issues, and we have seen heavy investment during the last five years in this area. But it requires all stakeholders involved in developing local communities to work together to make it pay real dividends.

Local government, in particular, is important. Relationships with the police are not close enough at present, and in areas of two-tier government, this can prove more difficult.

We must address the question of crime reduction and wider security on a strategic level, and to make sure those involved in LAAs are all involved in decisions around safer communities and the whole question of place-shaping.

With my background in local government, I hope to bring closer working relationships with councils and develop better understanding of overview and scrutiny between the police authorities and local government. It is important we develop relationships of accountability and answerability with both local authority colleagues, LAA members and the public.

To do this, we need to make sure the wider community understands that there is a proper system of scrutiny in place relating to police forces.

The role of the police authority is not just policing.

We provide an essential bridge between the constabulary and local communities, and have a key role in ensuring that there is real accountability to members for the decisions and actions the police are taking.

As we saw in the aftermath of Forest Gate raids following the 7/7 terrorist attacks in London, community engagement in policing is a key and essential factor we must work with in modern Britain.

We need to ensure we create the opportunities for wider debate over some of the more serious areas and link together much more closely with local councils and wider LAA stakeholders in establishing community and NHP policy, and, of course, maintain and expand the local forums groups where the police are held answerable to local people over local issues and problems.

The key, though, is more direct communication between the police and the public. Its important to have an opportunity to discuss not just policy issues but also mistakes and problems in a way that makes it clear the police are part of the community they serve, and are working both to reduce crime and the fear of crime.

So, we need to engender more trust and openness between the police and the public to make sure the service reflects the communities it serves, and those communities fully understand the needs and constraints officers face.

In Lancashire, we already have a heavy emphasis on the importance of neighbourhood policing and management.

But we recognise the police service needs to reduce red tape, make greater efforts to embed neighbourhood policing, ensure more effective dialogue with all elements of the community, let the public drive the police policy agenda and ensure we provide best value management of our resources. So, at the LPA, we have developed our ‘Investors in policing' campaign to take a much more proactive approach to linking into community groups using our elected staff, magistrates and independent members. The campaign aims to:

We believe that if we can share ideas, listen to each other and work together in a meaningful way, we will be much closer to delivering the safe communities everyone wants. n

Miranda Carruthers-Watt is chief executive of Lancashire Police Authority