CCTV control centre keeping you safe
Published
Monday 18 May, 2026
Updated
Monday 18 May, 2026
Swale Borough Council’s CCTV control centre has expanded their area of cover, quickly becoming a national safety hub.
The council’s control centre monitors Swale’s public space CCTV cameras 24/7, 365 days a year and works closely with Kent Police to tackle crime and keep residents safe.
Swale’s control centre has now partnered with Ashford Borough Council to monitor their cameras, which will bring in additional resources and staff, as well as help improve the control centres’ facilities.
As part of this partnership, the control centre will actively monitor their cameras 24/7 365 days a year, to the high standard of service they offer, whilst also providing cost-saving solutions.
This is in addition to the public space CCTV cameras the control centre monitors for other borough councils, local parish councils, and a number of commercial cameras for private contracts.
Swale Borough Council also oversees Swale Link, a business crime reduction partnership, which gives local businesses who sign up a radio to communicate with the control centre and the police, allowing for quick coordinated responses whenever any incidents occur.
The benefits of the scheme were seen recently when the control centre assistedwith the arrest of a man in Faversham wanted on recall for multiple offences, they helped lead the police to his location where he was attempting to hide under a car.
The CCTV also helped with an ongoing issue with nuisance off-road bikes, guiding police to where they were leading to them being detained and the bikes being seized.
The control centre isn’t only helping to tackle crime, it also looks out for people’s welfare – including helping a person who fell out of their wheelchair and had suffered a head injury, calling an ambulance to assist them directly following the incident.
There are also currently more than 102 businesses signed up to Swale Link, which uses a network of CCTV and instant communication to tackle thefts and other anti-social behaviour.
With a Swale Link member helping to alert the CCTV team to an ongoing theft and assault, leading to the identification, and the later arrests, of the perpetrators.
Swale’s control centre is exploring monitoring CCTV in other areas, growing the network of cameras, and making tracking criminal’s movements over council borders far more efficient and effective.
The funding from these partnerships has made increasing the size of the CCTV control centre building possible, allowing for additional staff to be hired and more cameras to be monitored.
The council is currently seeking planning permission for the improvement works to the control centre and has appointed a contractor.
Cllr Hannah Perkin, chair of Swale Borough Council’s Housing, Health and Communities Committee, said:
“Our CCTV control centre has been doing an incredible job keeping our residents and businesses safe - working closely with the police, fire and ambulance services to make sure the right help arrives when emergencies strike.
“It has been so effective we have now been able to partner with other councils, like Ashford, to help monitor their cameras too, and this growing network allows us to help police track criminals across council borders.
“The additional funding from these partnerships also allows us to invest right back into our service, improving the CCTV hub, hiring more staff and growing Swale Link.”
Cllr Katrina Giles, portfolio holder for Communities and Health, said:
“After careful consideration, last year the Council decided to join the Swale CCTV Partnership, which means our Ashford Monitoring Centre (AMC) has now been decommissioned as part of the Civic Centre redevelopment.
“From now on CCTV monitoring and out-of-hours call handling will be managed by Swale Borough Council, bringing savings to the service, with a proportion being reinvested into wider community safety initiatives. The Swale CCTV Partnership has a state-of-the-art control centre, which is due to be expanded in the coming months.
“They already provide security solutions for both public and private sectors, and we believe the residents of Ashford will continue to be in safe hands.”
Swale Borough Council’s control centre also offers a range of services from public space and commercial CCTV monitoring, access control, out of hours, and facilities management.
