A CAMPAIGN aiming to cut back on anti-social crime across the Malling area is due to launch this Friday. The annual Malling Neighbourhood Watch summer campaign - which roughly coincides with the school summer holidays - aims to stamp out vandalism, graffiti, littering and arson.

It involves about 8,500 households in villages including Wouldham, Larkfield, Leybourne, East Malling, West Malling, Wateringbury and Yalding. The campaign is expected to be launched at the East Malling home of regional co-ordinator Gerry Richards by the Mayor of Tonbridge and Malling, Cllr Stephen Cresswell, and representatives from the police and fire brigade.

Two rooms in Mr Richards' council flat have been converted into a hi-tech control room which can be used to monitor reports from each of the villages in the area and ensure that crimes are reported quickly to the emergency services.

Malling Neighbourhood Watch has been running summer campaigns since 1995 and, last year, successfully clamped down on bogus calls to the fire brigade.

Mr Richards said: "When we decided to run a Neighbourhood Watch for the Malling area we decided to do it properly, so I run a 24-hour control room. It is the only one of its kind in the country and it has been set up like a mini-police control room."