Around 200 local young people enjoyed a feast of sport and barrier breaking activities with police in a showcase event that was the precursor to weekly sessions at the Phoenix School starting on Tuesday 05 April Some of Britain's finest international athletics coached track and field events, leading street dance instructors took street dance classes, and community scheme coaches from Chelsea Football Club provided football coaching.
Each day kicked off with one of the most impactive talks any of the young people will have received. This was from two serving prisoners, released on licence from Category D HMP Latchmere House, specifically to support Met-Track, as they have before. They gave a very stark reality check on what life is really like behind bars, and described in graphic detail just why young people today would concentrate on their education, and steer well clear of guns and knives.
Activities with a difference followed the lunch break where the young people were treated to experiencing life on the other side of the glass with the Met's elite Territorial Support Group. Officers demonstrated how and why they used a lot of specialist equipment, gave the young people the opportunity to dress up in personal protective gear and even set up relay races whereby the youngsters donned body armour, shields and batons after being told exactly how and why these are deployed in London.
Scheme Director and Met Superintendent John Powell said: "These activities are exceptionally popular but there is a serious message that we convey and it is very clear that young people learned a lot about how we police public order situations and most importantly, why. It also broke down a lot of barriers between them and an organisation that many of them very clearly felt represented a less than approachable image."
The sports sessions were also very popular and won many plaudits from visiting teachers and visitors from the local community.
"It is very clear that we successfully reached much of our target audience", said Scheme Manager Jason Hussain. "We aim for an audience that may not necessarily otherwise had the opportunity or even considered engaging in sport. It was very clear to me that many sets of eyes were opened in Hammersmith and we are really optimistic that this scheme can produce some very positive results in terms of reducing local youth anti-social behaviour."
Scheme Director John Powell added: "huge credit is due to Police Community Support Officer Mel McClure who single handedly organised this event and has been raising funds to support it over a period of 2 years. We were delighted the event was so successful and rewarded all her endeavours.
"We don't have other launches on the horizon at the moment and so will be looking to consolidate the scheme on the boroughs currently running it. However, our priority now has to be to raise significant funding to sustain the scheme in the long term. To date, all our applications to the Lottery, the Mayor's Fund, Comic Relief and other sources have all been rejected and if that trend continues through 2011, we may find ourselves having to reconsider our potential to contribute towards the Olympic Legacy."
