BEGGARS and street drinkers were banished from the city centre as part of a new police drive.

The sustained effort to reduce 'harassment' in Worcester is in response to a survey, in which residents highlighted the problems caused by begging and street drinkers.

After surveying over 150 residents and traders in the centre of Worcester, police have been ordering problem people to leave the city centre and Diglis for 48 hours over the last few days.

Inspector Tanya Beckett, safer neighbourhood inspector and leading the operation said: "Worcester City Centre, as with most busy cities in Britain, has historically suffered from anti-social behaviour directly linked to the presence of street drinkers and persons engaged in aggressive begging.

"Whilst anti-social behaviour in Worcester City Centre has steadily decreased over the last 5 years, we are as a team acutely aware that we need to challenge the nuisance and intimidation caused to those going about their lawful business.

"We have listened carefully to feedback from our community and have conducted extensive public surveys during March 2017.

"This has shown us that nuisance ASB of this kind remains a key concern and is considered by many to be having a detrimental impact on the city as a whole.

"In December 2016 Worcester safer neighbourhood teams conducted a similar dispersal operation in Lowesmoor which resulted in several arrests and a marked reduction in incidents of disorder.

"We have now extended this across the city centre and Diglis, and a dispersal order is now in place until 7am on 29th April 2017, with an option to extend this for several more days.

"This is not a ‘one off’ and we will be ready to use this tactic repeatedly until nuisance offenders understand that anti-social behaviour will not be accepted in our city."

Inspector Beckett also dismissed any notion of victimisation, adding: "West Mercia Police have a strong relationship with homelessness and substance abuse charities in Worcester and this operation is not intended to victimise any person in need of support.

"However, we cannot accept continuing harassment of the public by these individuals who do not live in the defined dispersal area and are only there to purchase and consume alcohol or commit vagrancy act offences."

As of Friday morning, six people had been ordered to leave the area, as part of the drive which started on Thursday and will continue into Saturday, nobody had been arrested.

Beggars and street drinkers were banned from the city centre and Diglis for 48 hours by issue of notice with a map of the dispersal zone, and were warned they could be arrested if they returned during that time.

PC Dave Wise, working on the operation added: "The reaction so far has been mixed, but we let regular street drinkers and beggars know beforehand so there was no surprise when we issued dispersal notices.

"Survey comments suggest that people find anti social disorder in the centre intimidating and threatening and it puts customers off at local businesses.

"We have drawn a line so that people can access the support services they need to, so it is not hindering people issued with dispersal notices.

"We are hoping to make this operation a regular part of our toolkit, people said after the Lowesmoor operation that the police do this every now and again but only when it gets really bad and people slowly start coming back after.

"This is not what the police service does, we want to be regularly tackling this problem."

When asked about which areas of the city people particularly had concerns about, PC Wise added: "Obviously Lowesmoor, otherwise places like Foregate Street, where a lot of people are just entering the city and its the first thing they see.

"The regular street drinkers and beggars are generally not homeless or isolated from support from our research but are looking to take advantage of people."