City overtaken by ‘anti-social pot heads’, claims councillor

Kieran Molloy, Local Democracy Reporter

A councillor has claimed Cardiff city centre has been taken over by “selfish, anti-social pot heads” and called for greater powers to tackle anti-social behaviour.

The claim came during a debate on whether to introduce a PSPO for Cardiff city centre.

A PSPO is a legal measure that allows local authorities to restrict specific activities in public areas to reduce anti-social behaviour.

Breaching a PSPO without a reasonable excuse is a criminal offence.

Cllr John Lancaster (Conservative), put forward the idea, saying the introduction of the order would create a “cleaner and more welcoming environment”.

Supporting it, Cllr Calum Davies (Conservative) told the chamber how residents had told him that the city centre had become a “no-go zone” for them.

He said: “In the singular minute it took me to cross [Wharton Street], there were people screaming at the top of their lungs, someone urinating and another brazenly smoking an illegal substance.

“It was Saturday lunch time, that’s peak family time in our city centre.”

The councillor for Radyr and Morganstown specifically called out cannabis abuse, which he said was smoked “without apology” in public and “without a care for anyone else, including children”.

Cllr Rodney Berman (Liberal Democrat), said: “It is undoubtedly the case that there are problems in our city centre and that there are things that we need to do to try to improve the experience for everybody in that city centre.”

However, he added: “I don’t think we should just vote through [a PSPO] , as a council, on the basis of a hastily put together motion in front of us and then suddenly start creating the beginnings of a police state in Cardiff.

“It’s not necessarily working out very well on the streets of Minnesota, is it at the moment?”

‘Wrong approach’

Cllr Bernie Bowen-Thomson (Labour) opposed the Conservative motion, saying it “offers the wrong approach and the wrong conclusions”

She continued: “The Conservative approach jumps straight to enforcement through a PSPO as if it were a silver bullet and it certainly is not.”

Instead, the council agreed at the January 29 meeting to refer the matter of re-introducing a PSPO in the city centre to the Community Safety Partnership to consider if it would be “the most effective and proportionate means of addressing issues relating to drug use, anti-social behaviour and other concerns, or whether alternative interventions could be implemented more effectively or appropriately.”

The Community Safety Partnership is a multi-agency body aimed at tackling crime, disorder, substance misuse, anti-social behaviour and to safeguard people from abuse, exploitation and harm.

In addition, the council also resolved to support the renewal of the Business Improvement District in the upcoming Business Rate Payers vote on renewal.

‘Watered down’

Cllr Lancaster criticised the Labour amendment, which was later passed with 45 councillors voting yes, 10 voting no and 14 abstaining, as “watered down” and having “taken the teeth out of it”.

But Cllr Bowen-Thomson, member for Trowbridge, said Labour’s amendment to the Conservative motion offered “a more serious and effective way forward.”

They clarified that the amendment “crucially, does not rule out enforcement or a PSPO, instead it insists that any consideration must be evidence-led, must be proportionate, legally sound and, importantly, operationally deliverable.”