Additional reporting by Finn Macdiarmid

It was once the bustling heart of a thriving community, but in recent years Sittingbourne town centre - like hundreds around the country - has battled with decline.

As reporter Joe Crossley reports, closed-up shops, a loss of identity and gangs of bored youths roaming the streets contribute to a sense of unease, especially as night falls.

For most of my life I have lived a five-minute walk from what used to be a busy and vibrant High Street.

It was always somewhere to go and shop or meet friends and family for a meal or a pint.

But in recent times this sense of purpose has been replaced by a feeling of apprehension caused by a steady stream of low-level anti-social behaviour affecting traders and visitors.

Determined to get to the bottom of what’s gone wrong and what can be done about it, I spent a Friday evening in the town centre.

As darkness fell a large gang of hooded youngsters - aged around 10 to 17 - gathered on benches at the bottom of the High Street outside St Michael’s Church.

It’s not that they were doing anything wrong, but you can understand why this sight would be intimidating to people wanting to spend a night out in the town.

This is a point backed up by Sara Seabridge, whose Yellow Stocks micropub is just yards away.

She said: “Anti-social behaviour does put people off coming out because they think, ‘it’s all right going out, but going home - what’s going to happen if there’s a load of yobs around?’”

The 62-year-old has run the pub for six years and says customers repeatedly tell her they don’t want to be out late due to potential trouble.

Sara added: “These kids are 10 and 11-year-olds and they’re even out on weekdays after 10pm and 11pm, causing trouble. Why aren’t they at home?

“The perception of the town is intimidation. People feel intimidated and they don’t like coming out once it’s dark.”

At 5pm when I visited the venue, it seemed about half full - like most of the other restaurants and pubs I looked into during the course of the evening, which was a payday Friday.

The problems highlighted by Sara are nothing new for traders, unfortunately.

The area from the one-way system next to Lidl to beyond East Street by Aldi was labelled as “unsafe” and “intimidating” by Swale councillors in August last year due to street drinkers and anti-social behaviour.

The then divisional commander Chief Supt Shaun White paid a visit and told KentOnline there was actually a fall in crime thanks to the neighbourhood policing model launched months before.

By 6.30pm the High Street was almost empty except for a few families and small groups of people, prompting me to get in my car to visit the town’s other known trouble spots.

In East Street - another once vibrant area - there was no one around except for kebab shop workers and a few people popping in and out of the newsagents.

There have been worrying reports from this street recently, including a brick thrown at a car near Wells Pharmacy, an attempted break-in at the Chestnuts GP Surgery and an assault on a patient as they left the practice.

Less than a mile away at the Sittingbourne Retail Park, and unknown to me at the time, a weekend dispersal order had been put into place by the police.

As part of this, officers moved youths on and arrested an 18-year-old woman alleged to have stolen hundreds of pounds worth of goods from Marks and Spencer.

With the increased police presence, there wasn’t much happening but the retail park is well-known for trouble.

The previous weekend, a McDonald’s manager was headbutted and another staff member punched during an altercation with three teenage boys.

A 15-year-old later arrested has since been bailed.

Around 7.30pm I headed back towards the High Street via nearby Central Avenue where the police station closes to the public at 5pm.

During the Christmas Lights switch-on event on November 19, a group of around 10 yobs caused havoc.

They were seen throwing water bottles at an entertainment act, knocking barriers over and riding their bikes at members of the public.

The window at Shoe Zone was also smashed while some market stall holders reported thefts.

Police were called but by the time they arrived, the suspects had left.

As I drove back towards St Michael’s Church, the gang of children I’d earlier seen were messing about with passing cars – boys on either side of the road pretending they had a wire to stop vehicles passing.

They did the same as my colleague and I passed, but one must have seen we were filming and yanked at the handle to open the passenger door.

If I am being generous, they weren’t causing any real harm but their behaviour totally supports the points Sara at the Yellow Stocks and other townspeople regularly make.

A particular concern, however, was how young these boys looked beneath their hoods – no older than 10 in some cases.

This incident would have been seen on CCTV cameras Swale council runs from its control room in the town centre.

The authority previously received £900,000 as part of the government’s Safer Street Scheme which has gone towards the cameras as well as street marshalls, improved lighting and outreach workers.

It is where earlier that day I met Cllr Richard Palmer (Swale Inds), who chairs the council’s community and leisure committee.

The former soldier agrees there is an anti-social behaviour problem in Sittingbourne to which there is “no easy answer or solution”.

He pointed to Kent County Council’s cuts to youth groups as one reason behind the children’s behaviour.

Members had voiced their opposition last year in response to cuts to Swale Youth Consortium, which saw nine different services used by 2,000 youngsters, merged into a single-family hub.

Swale said at the time anti-social behaviour would get “worse” because of KCC’s decision - one made as it faces increasingly tough financial choices.

It is clear the town centre is facing serious challenges but is there a chance people are looking back with rose-tinted glasses and mis-remembering happier times?

Local historian Allen Whitnell says “yes and no” - things are worse than they used to be, but the town centre has seen a long and steady decline in terms of behaviour.

The 71-year-old, who is chairman of the Sittingbourne Heritage Museum in the Forum shopping centre, feels this started from the 1980s onwards due to changes in the way youngsters grow up.

“Children seem to have much less respect for authority, the law and their parents which is a cause for the anti-social behaviour,” he said.

“This could be because discipline at home and at schools has deteriorated as well as parents not being around as much due to both having to work.

“In the generation before, normally the mum stayed at home, whereas that is rarely the case now.

“Something needs to be done, you can’t have a policeman on every street corner so I don’t know how the problem is solved.”

So what, if anything, is the solution to the issue?

I met newly-elected Sittingbourne MP Kevin McKenna (Lab) outside the Card Factory in the heart of the town to ask what the government is doing to tackle town centre trouble.

While setting up my camera for the interview, a drunk with a can of booze in hand asked whether he could enter the closed gift and card shop.

After he wandered off, Mr McKenna explained how his inbox is filled with concerns from shopkeepers, residents and churches, all telling him the same thing.

“They’ve all had problems with vandalism or anti-social behaviour,” he said. “We need to make sure the behaviour is stopped and is controlled.

“We also need to change the perception of Sittingbourne, to somewhere that’s a safer place.”

He pointed to additional powers, including respect orders, which he believes will help improve the situation.

They will allow police and councils to ban persistent offenders from town centres and require that troublemakers attend mandated courses aimed at tackling their behaviour.

Mr McKenna said this will give the police and council more control over the streets as well as get people who are causing the issues to recognise the “harm and the misery” they are causing.

When you have such long-running problems as the town is experiencing, the finger will inevitably get pointed at the police.

I spoke to Swale area commander, Chief Inspector Vanessa Foster, outside Sittingbourne police station.

She says her officers are working with the council on schemes to steer the teenagers away from causing problems.

These include a football initiative which has been renewed for a second year.

The senior officer also says she has encouraged people to report incidents during public meetings so officers can be guided by data as to where to deploy resources.

She said: “So while anti-social behaviour potentially hasn’t gotten any worse, the reporting of it has gone up because we have encouraged reports.

“While people would love to see more bobbies on the beat, Swale does have a dedicated beat officer to every ward.

“We do have a plan for particularly Sittingbourne High Street and in the retail park to have another officer so that we have a seven-day continuity to ensure we have a permanent presence going into the new year.”

I spent five and half hours out in the town and although I didn’t see the level of disorder others regularly report, I saw enough to realise it is far from the vibrant and welcoming night out it once was.

Everybody I spoke to agreed there was a major problem with anti-social behaviour, but long-term solutions seemed few and far between.