What is anti social behaviour?

Anti social behaviour is a definition for a wide range of issues from crime and serious nuisance to less severe but frequent and annoying behaviour. It includes fear of crime or concern for public safety, public disorder or nuisance.

It takes many forms and includes a wide range of problems such as:

• Harassment
• Public disorder
• Unprovoked assault
• Racial abuse
• Graffiti
• Noise nuisance
• Fly-tipping
• Rubbish
• Abandoned vehicles
• Joy-riding
• Persistent nuisance
• Street drinking or begging

Anti social behaviour has a negative impact on the quality of life of the victims and on the environments in which communities live.

The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 defines anti social behaviour as ‘behaviour which is likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress to one or more persons not in the same household as the perpetrator.’

Because anti social behaviour is so wide ranging, we have set guidelines to work from. How we deal with anti social behaviour will depend not only on what type of behaviour it is but also on the frequency, severity and impact on those reporting.