Greater Manchester Police (GMP) is looking for members of the community in Bolton to ensure stop and search powers are used fairly.

In an effort to build better relationships within the town and around Greater Manchester, the Independent Community Scrutiny Panel exists for volunteers to review police stop and search footage and provide feedback on how officers deal with incidents.

People can sign up to the Independent Advisory Groups and Stop Search Scrutiny Groups to assist officers.

The Bolton News: Colin Adamson

The advisory group concentrates on Bolton and discusses operations and uses feedback in operations while the stop searches group revies footage and gives feedback on the quality of work by officers.

Dr Thaker, who works in the borough, is one such person who signed up the panel.

He said: “If you want your community to be looked after you need to help people looking after the community.

“It is about giving back as well as ensuring that you hold the people meant to be looking after us, held to a standard that is acceptable.

“What I have seen is that the feedback we have given has been taken positively and there have been changes made.”

GMP’s Inspector Nick Bonson is based at Bolton and welcomed more people to join the panels.

The inspector brought out the Independent Advisory Group and the Independent Stop Search Scrutiny Group to GMP's Operation Avro crackdown in Bolton earlier this month.

He said: “Ideally, we’d like the groups to reflect the demographic of Bolton from an age point of view, and for all the cultural perspectives, so the more people involved in that, then that gives us opportunity to respond to different feedback.

“If there is any interest in people to join then they should do so with the application forms.”

The chair of the Independent Advisory Group, Colin Adamson, said he got involved to assist police with their work and was enjoying the role to make things better in Bolton.

He said: “It’s attending meetings and coming along to the station to talk about what is going on in the area and giving advice on it.

“I am visually impaired, so it’s being able to offer a different perspective and it was a fantastic opportunity to help police and the community.”

For more information, email BoltonPreventionHub@gmp.police.uk or see this website. https://www.gmp.police.uk/police-forces/greater-manchester-police/areas/greater-manchester-force-content/careers/careers/iags/)