08/07/2013 BBC Oxford News

from Oxford. In tonight's programme: A 40% fall in youth unemployment.

Has a Brighter Future scheme in deprived parts of one town shown how

the problem should be tackled? Also - crime in the countryside.

Rural policing becomes a higher priority.

And later on - pot luck. The man who Good evening. Youth unemployment is

one of the most pressing and distressing effects of the economic

downturn. Since the recession, the number of teenagers now in

education, employment or training - a group known collectively as NEETS

- has soared. But in Banbury there's been a concerted effort to offer

meaningful job experience and workplace opportunities to 16-18

year olds. The results have been remarkable - the number falling

through the cracks, without training or a job on the horizon, has dropped

by 40%. The success comes as the government prepares to change the

rules on education for all 16-year-olds. Helen Catt reports.

18-year-old Aimee Tye from Banbury is on her way to work. She's a

business administration apprentice, but a year ago, she'd dropped out of

sixth form and was finding it hard to work out what to do.

I was looking for jobs, but I wasn't really doing anything for about

three months, I was just at home. It was quite difficult even with the

right grades and variance. Aimee got training with the YMCA -

after going to a youth job fair. It's just one of the ways young

people are being targeted. Others include job clubs and phoning NEETS

directly. It is about people. We can identify

those people and then do something about it. It doesn't matter how, it

is getting to those young people and encouraging them to get involved.

If you compare figures, you will see that in Oxfordshire, five points

percent are classified, in Bucks, 3.8% while Swindon has the highest

level at 7.3%. Here in Oxfordshire they have a very

high number of what is called not loans. The authorities here do not

know the status of a quarter of 16 to 18-year-olds.

From this summer, the government's changing the law so 16-year-olds

can't leave education entirely. They'll either have to stay at

school or college, like these trainee chefs, or get a job with 20

hours of training a week too. If you are disenfranchised or

disinterested young person, the thought of going for more education

terms your stomach. What we have got to say is, what do you want to do

life? If you want to earn money, there are lots of opportunities.

The government hopes the right training will help more people like

Aimee get into the workforce and stay there.

Getting to grips with rural crime was one of the key pledges made by

the Thames Valley's new Police and Crime Commissioner when he was

elected late last year. Today, the force has set out just how it's

planning to do that. A major change in strategy will see officers

investigating crimes committed on farms and in the countryside far

more thoroughly than typically happened in the past. They're

targeting criminal gangs who, up to now, have found the countryside an

easy target. Emma Vardy's been assessing what the changes mean and

she's here in the studio. Farms have been vulnerable, haven't they?

That is right. Large machinery thefts are a problem and farmers are

becoming big to organised crime. Is not uncommon for things like track

is or even combine harvesters to be stolen by criminal gangs. Officers

say that although crime has reduced, things like this can lead

to losses of hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Even though it has been going down for the last couple of years, we

recognise a big impact on the tin. It impacts upon their livelihoods.

It is very important that we focus on those crimes more this year.

What police going to do differently? They say they will investigate more

quickly and use covert operations to catch and minerals. Where will they

find the resources? Police they they will work more efficiently to get

this done, but having been asked to take on this priority, it will place

demand on their time. People will ask why it has not been

a high priority until now. This is an example of how the new

policing crimes commission is leading to changes. Previously

police were told to focus on burglaries, street robberies and

violent crime. Now that there is a police crime Commissioner he said

that he once more to be done to tackle rule incidents and something

that some argue has been overlooked. A 600-year-old Oxfordshire pub has

been left badly damaged following a fire. More than fifty firefighters

from two counties tackled the blaze at the Horse and Jockey in Stanford

in the Vale on Saturday evening. The pub, which had been full of

customers at the time, was evacuated, but no-one was hurt. The

cause isn't thought to be suspicious, and an investigation is

now underway. Child protection charity the NSPCC

has launched a new awareness campaign aimed at getting parents

and children to discuss the difficult issue of sexual abuse. The

number of crimes being reported in the Thames Valley has risen sharply

since the Jimmy Savile scandal, but the charity says 90% of abuse is

committed by someone close to the child victim. It's producing

age-appropriate leaflets and information for parents and schools,

to encourage children to speak up if they feel worried.

Conditions on our roads are very different now to when many of us

took the cycling proficiency test. Yet cycling safety experts believe

most youngsters in Oxfordshire aren't getting the up-to-date

training they need to prepare for the dangers they face. The county is

one of just a handful NOT to fully adopt the government-backed

"Bikeability" scheme. As Nikki Mitchell reports, many local schools

are still offering the traditional - and, some believe - less effective,

training. Venturing out on to Aylesbury is

busy roads flanked by professionally trained instructors. These pupils

are among five and a half thousand children in Bucks being given

training this year. My parents think it is a good idea to build my

confidence. We know how to look out for the right signs. We have to look

at for cars and if one comes, we have to signal.

Well Bucks has �200,000 of government cash to spend on

professional bike tuition, Oxfordshire only applied for

�10,000, so most rules still run the old-style cycling proficiency

training instead. I think my parents feel a lot more

obliged to B go out, like my own. have been thinking about what I

learned. Cycling proficiency is taught by parent followed ears and

despite being one of those volunteers, Richard Mann believes

that the programme is lagging behind.

We have now done the studies nationally and worked out what is

most effective and we think that the new way should be adopted. It is

more consistently delivered. main difference between the former

cycling visions the and the new one is that we can to get the children

on the road as much as possible to give them as much red experience as

we can. Because we are professionally trained and qualified

and insured, it means we can cycle with them to each location.

Oxfordshire county council says it strongly challenges the notion that

national bike ability is better than its own scheme. By using volunteers,

it is able to train many more youngsters in Oxfordshire in a more

cost-effective way. Electric bikes can now be hired by

people keen to explore Henley-on-Thames and the Chiltern

Hills. They're powered by rechargeable batteries and have a

small motor on the front wheel, so riders don't have to worry about

their fitness. The area has been identified as the ideal place to set

up the Chilterns' first electric bike network, because it already

attracts a lot of tourists. Lots of the kind of people that

visit the Chilterns might end up stuck in their cars and they might

not think about donning Lycra for a couple of hours. On an electric

bicycle you can enjoy the outdoors and you do not need to get sweaty.

It is a fantastic way to explore. ?NEWLINE Finally, his place in

history is already secured as the sixth Doctor Who, but now

Buckinghamshire actor Colin Baker is set to have his famous face made

into a bronze bust to support a local sculptor. Colin had his first

sitting today at Andrew Sinclair's studio's in Wendover. The head and

shoulders bust will take three months to make, and as Colin told us

it's likely to scare off any Daleks looking to take over the planet.

There are various 3-dimensional images of me as Doctor Who. There

are tall use and heads and bust and toys and all sorts of things. This

is the first one ever done of me, Colin, by a professional sculptor,

with the sitting. I am looking forward to seeing myself bronzed