THE Government was yesterday accused of "giving up" on Asbos after the latest official figures showed a sharp fall in the numbers being issued.
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said the decline reflected the success of early interventions – such as acceptable behaviour contracts and parenting orders – in "nipping problems in the bud".
However, the opposition parties said the fall amounted to a
n admission that the strategy, introduced by then Home Secretary Jack Straw in Labour's first term in office, had failed.
The latest Home Office figures showed the number of Asbos being issued in England and Wales had fallen from a peak in 2005 of 4,123 to 2,706 in 2006.
At the same time, Ms Smith highlighted the rising number of anti-social behaviour interventions, which had now reached a total of 26,675 compared to 7,444 when the survey began in 2003/04.
"The figures I have published today are further evidence of the progress we have made," Ms Smith said in a keynote speech in London.
"Where tough enforcement is needed it is happening, but we are getting in there early, nipping problems in the bud and putting a stop to them before they get of out control."
She said the courts would now be required to consider making a parent order when issuing Asbos for 10 to 17-year-olds.
However Shadow Home Secretary David Davis claimed the real reason for the fall in the number of Asbos was the increasing numbers that were being breached.
He said the Home Office's own figures showed that the average rate of orders breached had risen from 47 per cent in the period 2000-05 to 49 per cent in 2000-06.
In her speech, Ms Smith also unveiled plans to enlist officials, from housing benefits officers to TV licence inspectors, in the fight against anti-social behaviour.
She called for "better joined up working" by the police, local councils and other statutory authorities to expose the wider criminal activities of the most persistent offenders.
The small core of the most problems would, she said, face checks for benefit and council tax fraud, TV licence evasion and vehicle insurance dodging.
"The Government is firmly on the side of communities where people have had enough and there will be no escape for persistent offenders," she said.
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