Anti-social behaviour

Below is a list of our most frequently asked questions regarding ant-social behaviour.

1. What do I do if I am having problems with anti-social behaviour?
2. What can I do about noisy neighbours?
3. What are my responsibilities as a tenant?
4. What can I expect from Wyre Forest Community Housing?
5. Who else can help?
6. What if I do not want to give my name?
7. What is an injunction?
8. What is an Acceptable Behaviour Contract (ABC)?
9. What is an Anti-social Behaviour Order (ASBO)?
10. Can you evict tenants who cause anti-social behaviour?
11. What is domestic abuse?
12. What if I am experiencing domestic abuse?
13. What action will you take in cases of domestic abuse?
14. What else can you do to tackle domestic abuse?

1. What do I do if I am having problems with anti-social behaviour?

If you are having problems with anti-social behaviour, try to speak to the person who is causing the problem. They may not realise that they are causing you problems and so they may change their behaviour. If this does not solve the problem or you cannot discuss the problem with them, report the matter to your housing officer or to the Anti-social Behaviour Hotline on 0800 169 4002.

It may help to put your complaint in writing, as we can use this as evidence.

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2. What can I do about noisy neighbours?

If you live in a flat in one of our older properties and noise is a problem, you should remember that no property is completely soundproof and you may hear some noise from your neighbours. However, if you think the noise is louder than you would expect, follow the advice we have given above. If the problem is caused by criminal behaviour (for example, threatening or violent behaviour), contact the police. You should also tell us about any criminal behaviour, as we may be able to take legal action.

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3. What are my responsibilities as a tenant?

You should do the following:

• Make sure you keep to the terms of your tenancy agreement, which contains clauses about harassment and anti-social behaviour
• Report incidents to us (and other relevant agencies) when they happen
• Understand that we cannot investigate criminal behaviour and so you should report it to the police
• Understand and accept different cultures
• Treat other people as you would expect to be treated
• Support us in taking action against the people responsible (for example, by giving evidence in court)

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4. What can I expect from Wyre Forest Community Housing?

• We will record each incident you report
• We will respond in a way which is appropriate to the seriousness of the case
• We will draw up an action plan for dealing with the matter and keep you up to date with our progress
• If we cannot deal with a problem you have reported, we will explain why
• When we stop investigating a case, we will let you know
• We may ask you to give us a full witness statement if the case is serious or the nuisance has taken place over a long period of time. Our staff will prepare the witness statements for you if you have agreed to help us deal with a particular case
• We will monitor how satisfied you are with the way we have dealt with your complaint so we can improve our service in the future
• We will make sure that translation and interpretation services are available if you need them

There are some issues that we cannot deal with. If we cannot help you, we will aim to put you in touch with other organisations that might be able to help or we may offer to provide mediation (where an independent person helps the two sides involved in a dispute to come to an agreement).

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5. Who else can help?

For many cases of anti-social behaviour, more than one agency needs to deal with the problem. If the issues relate only to someone breaking their tenancy agreement, and so do not have a wider effect on the community, we will take responsibility for dealing with these problems (an example of this would be dealing with parking problems on an estate that we own).

In most cases, we feel the best way to sort out problems is to involve other relevant agencies. So we may involve the police, council departments set up to deal with anti-social behaviour and noise nuisance, and environmental health, social services and education departments.

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6. What if I do not want to give my name?

If you do not want the person to know that you have complained about them, you should make this clear to us. However, if you are the only person who has had a problem, it may be easy for them to work out who has made the complaint. We respect your right not to become directly involved in any legal action. Although we may accept statements from people who have not directly experienced anti-social behaviour, this makes it less likely that any legal action we take will be successful.

If we decide to take a case of anti-social behaviour to court, we will probably need you to be a witness. For the most serious cases of anti-social behaviour, we will consider using professional witnesses (such as anti-social behaviour officers or neighbourhood wardens) to gather information.

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7. What is an injunction?

A court can issue an injunction to stop somebody doing something. We can apply for injunctions to prevent certain types of behaviour. The advantages of an injunction are that it stops problems quickly and the person causing the problem can be arrested if they break the injunction. Injunctions force people to change their behaviour rather than make the person leave their home, so injunctions do not move the problem on to another place.

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8. What is an Acceptable Behaviour Contract (ABC)?

An acceptable behaviour contract is a written contract between the local authority, the police, a young person (aged 10 to 18) suspected of being responsible for anti-social behaviour, and the young person’s parents or guardians (the people responsible for looking after them). ABCs can be used for young people over the age of 18 if they still live at home with parents or guardians. An ABC is a legally binding contract, under which the young person agrees to stop acting in an unacceptable way.

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9. What is an Anti-social Behaviour Order (ASBO)?

ASBOs target people who are responsible for anti-social behaviour and can lead to them not being allowed in certain areas. If a tenant has been evicted, an ASBO can be used to prevent them from moving back into the same area. If the person responsible has broken an important part of their tenancy agreement or lease, we can take legal action to evict them.

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10. Can you evict tenants who cause anti-social behaviour?

We can only evict a tenant from their home with an order from the court.

Please remember that:

• it can take a long time to take a case to court
• cases rely heavily on independent witnesses (particularly those people who have experienced problems) coming forward
• there is no guarantee that legal action will result in the person responsible being evicted
• eviction proceedings can depend on us proving that the matter is serious enough to justify evicting the person responsible

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11. What is domestic abuse?

The Crown Prosecution Service define domestic abuse as: "a general term to describe a range of behaviour often used by one person to control and dominate another with whom they have a close or family relationship and in which the abuser operates from a position of perceived power".

Domestic abuse can take on many forms, such as:

• verbal abuse
• threatening or abusive behaviour
• physical assault
• harassment
• emotional abuse

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12. What if I am experiencing domestic abuse?

Don’t suffer in silence – report it to us. You can do this by:

• calling your housing officer
• writing to your housing officer
• speaking to any member of staff when they visit you
• calling the Anti-social Behaviour Hotline on 0800 169 4002

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13. What action will you take in cases of domestic abuse?

We will:

• listen to you
• take your complaint seriously, treat it in a sensitive way and respect your confidentiality
• provide help with interpreting or translating if you need it
• explain and agree what action to take against the person responsible
• provide you with support, if possible
• give you details of other specialist agencies who can help and advise you what to do
• with your agreement, take appropriate action against the person responsible – this could mean evicting them from your home
• support you to take your own action against the person responsible – this could mean applying for a court injunction
• respect your wishes if you do not want to take the matter further, unless other people are at serious risk

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14. What else can you do to tackle domestic abuse?

Domestic abuse is very serious and breaks our tenancy agreement. We want to deal with complaints and will take appropriate action as effectively as we can. However, we believe it is important to help tackle and stop domestic abuse in other ways too.

We:

• work with community groups and agencies such as the police, Women’s Aid, local authorities and victim support schemes
• encourage people to report domestic abuse
• have specialist staff who are trained to deal with victims of domestic abuse
• regularly review our policies and procedures on domestic abuse, equality and customer service
• can offer advice on short-term housing solutions
• can provide extra security at your home (such as alarms and sensors) through the Police Domestic Violence Unit

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