Make sure you stay safe during the summer holidays - Edinburgh Police Commanders

Rather than this column coming to you from a specific officer, it is an open letter to our communities from the division’s entire Command Team, including the Local Area Commanders for North West, North East, South West and South East Edinburgh.

Police Scotland are appealing for witnesses.

Your local policing teams also have the summer holidays on their minds ensuring that we mitigate against any rise in antisocial behaviour and disorder that we typically experience during the summer months.

We want young people on summer holidays to enjoy their downtime, but it must be done responsibly and not to the detriment of other members of our communities, so we’ll also be conducting high-visibility patrols throughout the summer to deter antisocial behaviour and respond appropriately whenever it is reported to us.

This street performer attracted a large crowd on the High Street, during the Fringe

The national proxy purchasing campaign, “It’ll Cost You” is also now in operation for 2025 and our plea to anyone over 18 is to refrain from buying alcohol for anyone under the legal drinking age. Alcohol enhances the vulnerability of young people and to purchase it on their behalf is a crime. If you are caught you face a fine, a prison sentence or both. Please don’t risk it.

We also want everyone, regardless of age to stay safe around open bodies of water, such as lochs and reservoirs during the summer holidays. These may look like attractive places to cool off and socialise, but beneath the surface of the water lie unseen risks. For more information on water safety visit https://watersafetyscotland.org.uk.

The new football season is only a few more weeks away and once again we’ll be liaising with Edinburgh’s two SPL clubs to ahead of all of their matches requiring police attendance to keep all in attendance safe.

Both Tynecastle and Easter Road stadiums provide a fantastic atmosphere for football fans and we want to keep that atmosphere safe and enjoyable for home and away support during every match of the season.

We want to finish this column with a look ahead to the upcoming Edinburgh International Festival and Fringe, which takes place across various parts of the city next month over the course of a month.

During this time, we’ll see the population of the Capital increase to around one million and it’s really important that we have appropriate high-visibility resources in place to engage with residents and visitors alike to offer reassurance, provide all required crime prevention advice and respond to any incidents that may arise.

We’ll also be offering crime prevention advice via our social media channels, so please follow Edinburgh Police Division on Facebook and @PSOSEdinburgh on X for all of our information and updates.

All relevant advice is available 24/7 on our website at www.scotland.police.uk.