ACPO Secured by Design

Secured by Design aims to bring together the principles of designing out crime, effective crime prevention and security standards for a range of applications and products.

ACPO Crime Prevention Initiatives, owners of the Secured by Design crime prevention programme commissioned research into perceived conflict between the current ecology/sustainability agenda and police advice on security, in particular, burglary prevention in homes and buildings. Part two of the research has also identified crime as a significant contributor to UK CO2 emissions.

The contention is that Secured by Design and other effective crime prevention measures assist in reducing the carbon footprint of the UK and we are already taking action to support the recommendations of the research, the key findings of which are:

• Planning decisions do have substantial crime consequences.
• Security and sustainability are usually not perceived to be in tension by domain experts, and there are substantial areas of synergy.
• The research did not identify any features of sustainable design which would prevent a development from achieving Secured by Design (SBD) accreditation. Equally, no features of SBD were identified which would make it difficult to achieve a high rating on the Code for Sustainable Homes.
• Crime control is an important contributor to the establishment of stable, sustainable communities, which should be reflected in its weighting in the Code for Sustainable Homes.