HELENSBURGH and Lomond’s new police inspector says he is committed to using a "very robust policing style" to tackle youth disorder and antisocial behaviour in the area.

Roddy MacNeill took up the role in December, moving from a similar position in Dumbarton to replace Allan Kirk.

After starting his police career in Clydebank, Inspector MacNeill has 18 years of service experience and he said he has a firm idea of where the priorities should lie for the year ahead.

He told the Advertiser: “I’ve stayed in Balloch my whole life so I know the area very well.

“There’s not a great deal of change needing done here but I’ve got a slightly different way of doing things, a very pro-active, problem solving policing approach.

“There will be no great change overnight but certainly antisocial behaviour and youth disorder [will be areas we will focus on].”

While admitting that the level of ‘serious crimes’ in his new patch is generally minimal, Inspector MacNeill reiterated his intention to tackle any form of criminality at as early a stage as possible, beginning with youth intervention.

He added: “The majority of folk here are affected by what we would term as low-level criminality, but it causes the greatest upset in the community.

“So, a very robust policing style is required as far as that type of behaviour goes.

“In Dumbarton it was highly publicised that we were at the top of the scale in Scotland at one point for youth disorder, so I led the work and eradicated that.

“We don’t have the same problems here, thankfully, at this time, but the mechanisms available to me are in place to tie in with the council regarding repeat addresses, noisy parties, antisocial behaviour, houses – there’s plenty of legislation there to allow us to deal with these folk.”

* More from our interview with Inspector MacNeill in this week's print edition of the Advertiser – on sale from Thursday, January 17.