A GWENT council which leads the way in Wales in combating anti-social behaviour will be passing on its skills to help others.

Torfaen council's Anti-Social Behaviour Unit was visited by Christine Kent, the deputy director of the Home Office's own Anti-Social Behaviour Unit in London.

Last week's visit was arranged to congratulate the authority and to pick up new techniques for dealing with anti-social behaviour, which will then be applied nationally.

She was taken on a whistlestop tour from Blaenavon to Cwmbran to see the area that authorities have been working in and how techniques have been adapted for Torfaen's needs.

A spokesman for the Home Office said: "The Anti-Social Behaviour Unit has been visiting authorities all over the country that have been pioneering new models of tackling anti-social behaviour.

"We're using their examples and experiences to support best practice, so everyone can benefit by learning new ways of dealing with these problems."

Torfaen's community safety officer, David Jeremiah, said: "We're one of the leading authorities in Wales for tackling anti-social behaviour, and we were recommended by the regional crime director in Cardiff as an authority who are having a lot of success with this.

"It's part of the government's drive to tackle this problem. Underlying it all is the fact that crime is coming down, but the perception is that crime is still a monster. "She's interested in our programme and, more importantly, the system that we've got in place and the very close relationship that we have with the police.

"Almost uniquely, we have a police officer in the team here which allows the sharing of information.

"The Youth Offending Team was set up to prevent offending. They do pre-emptive work to make a child who is showing the first signs of behaving badly, stop.

"She was impressed. The last conversation we had was about running a project to tackle alcohol consumption. That's a big factor affecting public well-being and it takes up a huge amount of police time."