Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) from Newport Pagnell, gave bicycle safety advice to students, supporting their School Travel Plan, which had been set up by Milton Keynes Council’s Road Safety team.

PCSOs Dave Huckle and Paul Swannell were approached by Jessica Smith, a School Travel Plan advisor, to see if they would like to take part in Milton Keynes’ first Junior Road Safety Officers (JRSO) conference, which was held on 19 June at Giffard Park Community Centre. Dave and Paul were happy to be involved in the scheme and prepared a workshop for the students at the event.

At the workshop, PCSOs Huckle and Swannell showed students an example of what a safe and secure bicycle should look like, compared to a very poor example. This was followed by a talk about cycle safety.

PCSO Huckle, said: “We had a great morning working with the young people, who participated in discussions and games to promote cycle safety, and it was another success in partnership working. We look forward to the next conference to help improve student’s awareness of bicycle safety.”

Jessica Smith, School Travel Plan advisor, Milton Keynes Council, said: “We introduced the JRSO scheme in Milton Keynes in January of this year and so far 24 schools have signed up.

“The scheme aims to encourage primary school children aged 10 and 11 to teach their fellow pupils about road safety. They have three main responsibilities which include; speaking in assemblies, maintaining a notice board; and running competitions and campaigns. The JRSO conference was our first opportunity to get the JRSOs from the different schools together and we wanted to run workshops that were fun for the children but that also taught them some important Road Safety messages.

“It was fantastic that David and Paul volunteered to run the workshop and the children really enjoyed learning about the different parts of the bikes and how to ride safely. We are really happy to have this link with Thames Valley Police and we are looking forward to working with David and Paul again in the near future.”