Council officers will patrol the streets of every ward in Barnet in an attempt to tackle crime and anti-social behaviour.

A shake-up of Barnet Council’s community safety team will see the number of street-based officers rise from six to 21 and their shift patterns move from five to seven days per week.

It means uniformed officers will be able to patrol each of the borough’s wards on the look-out for offenders, as well as making it easier for residents to report incidents.

The community safety team’s objective is to tackle all forms of anti-social behaviour, burglaries, hate crimes and other criminal activity, including various types of fraud and environmental crime.

According to a council report, the shake-up of the team comes in response to a “general increase in crimes such as fly-tipping, anti-social behaviour, burglary and acts of violence, as well as hate crimes”.

But although these incidents have been investigated, the report adds that “there has not been any noticeable increase in the identification and capture of perpetrators leading to prosecutions or any other sanctions by council officers”.

In addition, residents have warned that they do not know who to contact to report incidents and complained of having waited long periods “for any meaningful council action to take place”.

Under the changes, the number of posts in the team will be increased from 28 to 30, and a head of service for community safety will be created.

The 21 street-based officers will attend and investigate all reported incidents of fly-tipping and anti-social behaviour. They will work alongside residents, businesses and partners, including the Metropolitan Police and law enforcement agencies, to carry out investigations and help with intelligence gathering.

Declan Khan, the council’s assistant director of counter fraud, community safety and protection, set out the changes in the report to the council’s constitution and general purposes committee on Thursday.

He told councillors that to tackle increases in crime “we believe we need more people out on the street”, admitting that the time taken to deal with offences had been “longer than we would like”.

The changes to the community safety team were unanimously agreed by the committee and will take effect in February.