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People living in Skipton are being urged by North Yorkshire Police to lock their doors following a spate of opportunistic burglaries.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service said Sgt Paul Evans gave a presentation at Skipton’s annual meeting at the town hall, where he said it was “concerning” that burglary levels had risen since last year.

He added that Craven remained one of the safest places to live in the country and the cost-of-living crisis could be a possible reason behind the trend.

“A lot of people are complacent in Skipton, some properties are broken into when people have forgotten to lock the front door."

Sgt Evans said the police often rely on home security systems like cameras which can help in a prosecution.

He said: “We have suspects and then things like Ring doorbells help a lot.

"They are not the most genius of criminals in Skipton so the cameras give us a lot.”

The officer also said there had been 519 reports of anti-social behaviour in Skipton over the past year.

Many of these disputes were between neighbours that police had tried to resolve.

There had been 60 reports of hate crimes in the town.

A hate crime is any incident where someone is assaulted or verbally abused because of their race, religion, sexual orientation, disability or if they were transgender.

According to the LDRS a council report published last month said there has been a 10% rise in reported hate crimes since last year across North Yorkshire with the ongoing Gaza war fuelling religious tensions.