A petition has been started to make Fallowfield safer for students

A third year University of Manchester student has started a petition to make Fallowfield safer for students.

The petition will be delivered to Greater Manchester Police and Andy Burnham in a bid to make them do more about safety in Fallowfield.

Matt Harvison has taken the initiative to do something about the growing number of burglaries and muggings that take place in the area.

"I saw on Facebook that basically every day for the past few weeks there's been more and more burglaries. These robbers are preying on vulnerable students.

"A friend of mine got robbed today in broad daylight whilst they were in the house. It's not something we can combat ourselves, we need support from the police and the Mayor."

It is true that the crime rate in Fallowfield is high, with 133 crimes being reported to the police in August 2017 alone.

Matt told us "Obviously the public sector is under massive strain at the moment with budget cuts and our city is massive. But even little things like police knocking on doors and giving tips on how you can make your home safer and things to do in an emergency would make all the difference."

GMP crime map for August 2017

Anna Broomby, also a student at UoM, was robbed whilst she was in her house.

"There were four of us in, two upstairs and two downstairs. My flatmate left his room for no longer than five minutes, and when he came back his laptop, phone, wallet and watch were gone. They used Find My iPhone and saw that his phone was just down the road.

"When they went outside to look they found his wallet and phone dumped outside the house next door.

"The police were very helpful, they called crime scene investigators but the person that did it was wearing gloves so they could not get any fingerprints. Another house on our road was also robbed.

"It has definitely made me more weary, and I'm scared to open my window if it's too warm because I don't trust that someone couldn't just come in."

Matt's petition is asking for more support from the Manchester authorities, and needs 500 signatures to be sent to the Mayor.

Sign the petition here.