A REDUCTION in crime and underage drinking is down to a scheme targeting young people piloted in west Oxfordshire, police have claimed.

In 2007, West Oxfordshire Safer Communities Partnership developed one of the first alcohol education workshops in the country after an increase in the numbers of young people caught drinking in public in the district.

From November 2007 to January this year – while the workshops ran – 392 offences were committed by youngsters, compared to 538 between August 2006 and October 2007, before the trial – an overall reduction of 27 per cent.

The workshops ran in conjunction with Operation Judicious, during which police officers and PCSOs confiscated alcohol from underage drinkers.