Meet the Crime-Fighting Volunteers Patrolling Bournemouth at Night
17th August 2025
As dusk approaches in Bournemouth, nine men and one woman are gathered in a town centre car park. All are dressed in black, wearing dark blue tabards with the words “Safeguard Force”. They are about to set off on their evening patrol in an area where, the group says, “our streets are not safe” and “our women walk in fear”. Tonight’s volunteers are a mixed bunch, but there’s a preponderance of tattoos, powerful frames and bulging muscles.
“We don’t like the word ‘vigilantes’, don’t like it at all,” says Gary Bartlett, the group’s founder. It’s a word some in the town are using to describe the group, but others appear to be welcoming them with open arms. There is, many believe, something rotten at the heart of Bournemouth, and the hope is that Bartlett and his friends can help to fix it.
Safeguard Force calls itself “a voluntary community service set up to protect the most vulnerable”. Semi-uniformed, unofficial, unregulated, they say their aim is to deter crime and assist an overstretched police service on streets that have become lawless. Launched earlier this month, they patrol the town centre every evening from 7.30pm: they have plans to extend their hours, and to roll out the idea nationwide.
When the government neglects it’s first duty, to keep order and protect the people, then said people will have to do it themselves. This ought not to come as a surprise to anybody.