Brighton and Hove’s traffic wardens will be given body worn cameras to help gather evidence when drivers are violent or abusive towards them.
The wardens, known officially as civil enforcement officers (CEOs), will start wearing the cameras on their chests on Monday, 3 July.
The officer only begins recording if they feel they’re in a situation where it will help with their safety. The CEO will announce that recording has started.
All recordings are encrypted and stored and processed securely – CEOs are not able to view or edit footage. Recordings are kept for a period of 45 days, unless there is a lawful requirement to keep them longer.
Denise Payne, Client Account Manager for NSL, which manages traffic enforcement in Brighton and Hove said: “Civil Enforcement Officers have long experienced unacceptable levels of verbal abuse and violence towards them whilst simply trying to do their job.
“We hope that the introduction of Body Worn Video Cameras will deter much of this behaviour but also provide us with the evidence we need to pursue prosecution where applicable.”
Councillor Trevor Muten, chair of the Transport and Sustainability committee said: “The safety of our staff is extremely important and so I’m very pleased we’ll soon see CEOs wearing body worn video cameras.
“They’ll support them to carry out their vital role in keeping our city moving. They deserve the respect any of us would expect when doing our jobs.
“Violence and abuse towards our CEOs won’t be tolerated and any evidence captured which shows this will be passed onto the police.”
Reasonable, but there is also an element, from my experience, that engaging the camera also escalates a situation, so to be used in caution.