PARK wardens are out patrolling Basildon's parks and open spaces from today (Thursday, 1 April) to improve community safety.

It follows on from a pledge made last month in the wake of a number of attacks on women in the borough.

The team of five includes four wardens who will be patrolling parks, and a controller monitoring the CCTV footage and advising them from the team's base.

The wardens will be in borough parks seven days a week and will be wearing live Halo cameras and will be tracked via GPS to be able to best deploy wardens to areas and potential incidents.

In addition to the regular patrolling, residents are able to report any anti-social behaviour on an anonymous reporting line (a text to 60060) or incidents can be reported on Twitter via @AIBReportit. Wardens will then be deployed to incidents as soon as they come in.

Deputy Chief Executive of Basildon Council, Mandie Skeat, said: "We're blessed with fantastic parks and open spaces in the borough, and we want our residents to feel as safe as possible when they visit them. Park wardens are one of the measures we're implementing to improve community safety across the whole borough.

"The wardens will be active and visible from the morning into the late night and will wear body cameras to capture any unacceptable behaviour in our parks. I strongly encourage residents to report any anti-social behaviour they see in our parks to 60060, as then we will be able to respond and deal with these incidents as quickly as possible.

"This initiative will be on an initial three-month trial basis, with the effectiveness being evaluated at the end of the trial period. If they are proving successful, wardens will become a feature of our parks moving forwards."