It was 8.45pm on Monday when I spotted the three men on patrol in the centre of Bournemouth, a seaside resort on England’s southern coast.
They were young men with athletic builds, aged perhaps in their mid-20s. They were dressed in black. Two wore military-style boots with the ends of their trousers tucked inside. The third made do with trainers.
They had walkie talkies attached to their belts. Each also wore a dark blue reflective vest. On the front was some sort of insignia. On the back, it said: “Safeguard Force”.
I sauntered behind the men for a few minutes as they walked up Old Christchurch Road, a pedestrian thoroughfare in the town’s commercial core. They moved along slowly, appearing for all the world like bobbies on the beat.
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Yet Safeguard Force has nothing to do with the police or any official entity. It is a self-appointed group of volunteers who say they patrol Bournemouth’s streets to keep people safe.
Some local critics, meanwhile, have derided it as an ideologically motivated “vigilante” group, a description that it strongly rejects.
For the few minutes that I observed them, the three Safeguard Force volunteers didn’t interact with anyone else. Bournemouth is a busy summer destination. This week, the Liberal Democrats were also in town for their party conference.
Yet the streets on Monday were quiet, apart from a few small groups of young men hanging around on public benches by the street.
As we passed Cosy Club, a cocktail bar, I could hear some of the conversation between the Safeguard Force members. One was reading from his mobile phone. They were talking about GB News.
On Tuesday morning, I spoke to the founder of Safeguard Force, a local businessman, Gary Bartlett. The group began its patrols in mid-August at about the same time that public angst in Britain was at its highest over the issue of asylum seekers in hotels.
Bartlett said he had “grown nervous” about public safety in Bournemouth due to several high profile rapes and stabbings.
The most notorious recently was the murder in May last year of Poole woman Amie Gray (34), while her companion Leanne Miles was badly injured.
The friends were randomly targeted on Durley Chine beach late at night by knifeman, Nasen Saadi. Last March the criminology student (21), from London, was jailed for life and told he must serve at least 39 years.
Bartlett said he had daughters of his own. He had a “fear over what Bournemouth has become”. There were not enough police on the beat, he said. “So we decided we would put something together to replicate that.”
Safeguard Force, which operates seven nights a week in the town centre and along the promenade, has more than 60 “vetted” volunteers who do patrols. I asked Bartlett who did the vetting. He said Safeguard Force did it itself.
The volunteers are backed up by a further 15 or so administrative helpers, Bartlett said. The group raises money online for equipment and uniforms.
I asked if the group had any specific political affiliations. He insisted it did not. “We play it straight down the middle in that respect. We are not political,” he said.
Bartlett said Safeguard Force mainly acted as a “visual deterrent”. He said it operated entirely within the law and volunteers contacted police if they saw any criminal or antisocial behaviour.
Yet, clearly, they are also prepared to intervene themselves.
On Monday night, Bartlett said, Safeguard’s volunteers encountered a man who “apparently had a knife” at or near a local bus. He said the volunteers “detained him” until police arrived.
This week, Safeguard Force was to expand its patrols to Poole, a town about 11km along the coast. “We’re also getting a lot of calls about Southampton,” Bartlett said of the major port city about 50km away.
He acknowledged the group had its critics, although he claimed to be winning some of them over.
Bournemouth West Labour MP Jessica Toale said Safeguard Force was a “self-appointed, unregulated group” and its activities risked “an abuse of artificial power”.
Dorset Police have said they have “concerns” over Safeguard Force and have held talks with it over its activities. Local councils have also shunned it. Bartlett told The Irish Times he was “keen to work” with authorities.
Bartlett was previously an administrator of a Facebook page that helped to organise protests at asylum hotels. He has said this was entirely separate from Safeguard Force, which, he said, had its own procedures and was not political in any way.
Meanwhile, the newspaper Byline Times reported that one of the group’s leading members ran in local elections for Reform UK, the right-wing party led by Nigel Farage.
Later on Monday evening, I walked along the promenade to Durley Chine beach and the spot where Gray was murdered last year. The area was relatively quiet apart from a few joggers, which included a handful of lone women.
The area was isolated, far from the main road and dimly lit. There were no Safeguard Force volunteers in sight. Nor were there any police.
Bournemouth, like many towns, has its problems. Safeguard Force believes it is part of the solution. Meanwhile, its critics want it disbanded. Bartlett said it was there to stay.
