There's a new face on the beat in Marlborough after Clare Wallace took over from Barry Reed as the town’s neighbourhood policing team sergeant.

Sgt Wallace, 35, was appointed to the post in May but had to take six weeks sick leave shortly afterwards.

She is now getting settled into the area, having moved from Salisbury where she worked for seven years.

“I love it here. I didn’t know what I’d make of it initially because I thought it was a different world from where I was coming from, but I’m really enjoying it," she said.

“The place is amazing, the people are lovely and I’m enjoying getting to know where everything is and who everyone is. All of the team know so much about their areas, they’re very experienced, so I can learn as much as I can about the world of NPT from them.”

The neighbourhood police team is currently focusing on road safety, thefts from beauty spots and anti-social behaviour.

Sgt Wallace said: “Road safety is going to be a long-term one. It’s always an issue with the main routes running through villages. That’s always going to be a priority of ours.

"We’re trying to get out as much as possible to the beauty spots to educate people not to leave their valuables and we’ve got leaflets for cars to do as much as possible to prevent thefts.

“We’ve had some reports of youths free-running – jumping across rooftops.

"Unfortunately we don’t think it’s people who’ve been going to training groups, which is potentially very dangerous.

“We’ve had reports at St Mary’s, the library and Postern House and we have been carrying out patrols in the area.

“The anti-social behaviour priority is a combination of tackling the free running and, with it being the summer holidays, groups of youths gathering in the evening, drinking and making a bit of noise.”

Sgt Wallace, who started as a PC in Tidworth, is hoping to keep people in the community up to date with what Marlborough NPT is doing via Facebook and Twitter.