Police officers will be talking to teenagers in Kidlington following reports of noise and intimidation.

Members of the Kidlington Neighbourhood Team will talk to groups of teenagers in hotspot areas in the village following complaints from residents.

The new scheme is the brainchild of Kidlington neighbourhood sergeant Colin Travi, who set up the Youth Agency Targeting Group to help form a better relationship with young people in the village.

He will hit the streets with youth workers, local councillors, licensing officers and hopefully business representatives in the next few weeks, all of whom want to meet the youngsters and suggest new things they can do.

Sgt Travi said: “I want to try to draw youths to other agencies and show them some sort of direction and maybe identify youths who might be vulnerable and point them toward the agencies that can help them.

“Some people might argue it’s a bit of a PR exercise, but it isn’t. I want to get youths hanging around on the street to go to another area and point them to places they can go to stop them feeling as if there is nothing to do.

“It’s trying to get them occupied in something positive.”

High Street, the car park behind Tesco and near Exeter Hall, are all popular areas where young people meet.

Sgt Travi hopes to work with Costa Coffee in Kidlington which will open its shop for young people one evening a week following a similar successful initiative in Bicester.

In addition, he hoped the exercise would prove useful in gathering intelligence on illegal activities in the area.

He said: “We will be targeting areas where youths hang out. We get complaints from residents about youths being rowdy and we want to direct them away from that type of activity and put them into more positive environments.

“It’s one of those things where people feel there is a perceived threat or fear of young people loitering on the street. We want to reassure residents we are doing something about it.

“I would like the youths of Kidlington to have more say about how Kidlington is run. They don’t tend to engage with the authorities, so by us going out on the street they can say what they would like and what they would like to do.

“It’s also time for us to get to know them and them us and hopefully reduce crime. I’m hopeful it will have a positive effect.”