PEOPLE in Kingswood have been told they need to report incidents of bad behaviour at the village hall if they wanted police to take action.

The hall has been a meeting place for young people for many months and residents complained to the parish council about the behaviour of some young people.

The issue was first raised in October. Residents said when they approached groups about them using the car park as a meeting place, they were victims of verbal abuse and threatening behaviour.

The council had hoped to solve the situation by closing the driveway gates to the hall.

Since this has been happening when the hall is not in use there has not been such a problem but youths are still using the site to meet when the gates are open.

At Monday's council meeting chairman Cllr Paul Hemming said: "I don't think we have had as many complaints, apart from the one resident. It just mystifies me that they can't find somewhere more interesting to go."

But he pointed out it still put people off going there, especially when cars were parked next to each other as young people talked or played music.

But he added that not all young people behaved badly, saying: "A majority of Kingswood kids are fine."

Since the original complaints police and Stroud District Council neighbourhood wardens have patrolled the area and spoken to groups about their behaviour. Police community support officer for Wotton-under-Edge Tracy Wren told councillors: "We make a point of visiting the village hall once, if not twice, a day when we are on duty. We have had police officers going in there and checking vehicles.

"In the last two to three months it hasn't been such a problem. The kids are all aware that the gates have been closed. It has been better since they were closed."

She added: "If these incidents keep happening, we have got to know about it so we can attempt to do something about it. If we don't know about it, we can't do anything about it."

Police said this week they had not had complaints of young people behaving badly recently.