Blunkett meets 'zero tolerance' chief

Home Secretary David Blunkett is to meet the pioneer of New York's "zero tolerance" blitz on crime as he struggles to get on top of street robbery and disorder in Britain's inner-cities.

He is planning to visit New York in spring to talk to George Kelling, the criminologist who originated the notion of "order maintenance" - cutting crime by concentrating police effort on a small area with particular problems like street robbery, drug-dealing or prostitution.

Mr Kelling's theory of "fixing broken windows" explained how neighbourhoods decayed when vandalism and graffiti were ignored and aggressive begging, prostitution and anti-social youths went unchecked.

The meeting comes as the Government is coming under pressure over rising street robbery and latest monthly figures show London is facing a surge in total crime of between nine and 13 per cent.

Later this month, the Home Office will launch experiments with "policing priority areas" to combat crime in some of London worst estates, signalling the start of what Mr Blunkett calls a "drive against the disintegration and fracturing of decent behaviour".

The pilot schemes will try to "turn round problem areas" by targeting action by police and other agencies against specific local difficulties such as youth crime, vandalism and drug abuse.

Sources close to the Home Secretary say he is personally reluctant to adopt the term "zero tolerance" and is anxious to stress that he is not advocating heavy-handed police tactics in the inner cities. But his trip to the US - coupled with his plans for a new breed crime-fighting civilian street wardens - show he considers a strong visible police presence as the key to driving down crime and anti-social behaviour.

Tactics found to be effective in New York included quadrupling the number of police in a high-crime area. But Mr Blunkett is convinced that police alone cannot win the fight against crime and disorder and the community as a whole needs to work with them. He wants problem areas to follow the example of the Cowley Estate in Brixton, which has begun to rid itself of the scourge of crack cocaine.