CIRV referenced for “Exemplary Policing Practice” for the development of trust-based relationships

Community Initiative to Reduce Violence

A police-led intervention called Community Initiative to Reduce Violence (CIRV) in Northamptonshire develops trust-based relationships with gang affected and involved children. CIRV actively addresses the problem of the lack of young people consenting to support and this model was discussed in multiple instances throughout the strategic roundtable as exemplary policing practice. CIRV operates at all hours of the day, and officers consistently travel across the country to collect children, offering a sequence of interventions to get young people to where they would like to be. It was reported at the roundtable that parents of affected children agreed that CIRV worked well. While CIRV have spoken 
to a third of police in the country about developing the programme, they found that many teams are not receptive and officers at the event observed how programmes such as CIRV heavily rely on the dedication of individual officers and are hard to replicate across different teams.