Between 2011 and 2015, the Police Foundation’s Police Effectiveness in a Changing World research team worked closely with the police and their community safety partners in Luton and Slough – two English towns that had experienced the local impact of global change particularly acutely.

This is one of two final reports from the Police Effectiveness in a Changing World project which details the process, experience and research findings from Luton. The research started with a problem-oriented approach to burglary, with a particular focus on the way local communities are changing and the implications of this on dealing with crime.

Using action research we identified local crime problems, improving the way they were understood and developed interventions to tackle them. Then we assessed the outcomes of these and the challenges of implementing them.

Throughout the project we drew on the wider evidence-base on police effectiveness to promote local partnerships, to better deal with the ‘changing world’ and to find sustainable solutions to local crime problems. Most importantly we sought to learn lessons from the process of working with forces on the ground.