WE sat down with the new Chief Constable of North Wales Police, to find out her hopes and aims for the force.

Chief Constable Amanda Blakeman took up the post in recent weeks following the departure of her predecessor, Carl Foulkes.

She is the first female Chief Constable in the history of North Wales Police and joins from Gwent Police, where she was Deputy Chief Constable.

"It is incredibly humbling," she said.

"I've worked with lots of police staff and officers across my 30-year career, male and female, who have been absolutely outstanding.

"To be in the position of leading colleagues and perhaps paving the way for future Chief Constables is a real privilege; I don't take that lightly.

"The officers and staff in North Wales are very connected to their communities and that's really valuable."

What can people expect from North Wales Police under your leadership?

Chief Constable Blakeman said: "One thing I really want to focus on is being able to deliver for local communities on the things that are really important to them, especially around crime and the things that cause absolute misery for them on a daily basis; anti-social behaviour, drugs.

"In addition, I want to build that trust and confidence that the community has in us to report things - which is incredibly difficult and sensitive in cases of domestic abuse and sexual violence."

How will North Wales Police continue tackling county lines drug gangs?

The Chief Constable said: "North Wales has been relentless around this area and we will continue to be relentless, using everything I have available to me to be able to prevent these individuals getting a grip on and within our community.

"I work closely with the Chief Constables of other forces to make sure we benefit, share intelligence and that we seek to do operations together to prevent that criminality from taking hold.

"What people can expect to see from us is that continued relentless pursuit of those individuals who cause this type of misery."

READ MORE: Meet Amanda Blakeman - the new Chief Constable of North Wales Police

Police now respond to a wide variety of welfare and social related callouts which overlap with other services - how has the role of a police officer changed over the years and where is it going?

She said: "I think there are still lots of elements that hold true to the original mission of policing.

"Society has developed and changed, I definitely think we see people seeking to exploit opportunity.

"As a service, we have to be on the front foot in preventing that from happening.

"The mission of policing is very much the same - reassuring the public, preventing and detecting crime, preserving life.

"But I think the environment we're working in has become more complicated."

What are your thoughts on the way NWP tackles rural crime?

Chief Constable Blakeman said: "As chief constables, we take responsibility for various portfolio areas nationally, and I have responsibility for acquisitive crime and the Police National Database.

"A lot of the work I have been doing around acquisitive crime is focused on rural criminality, especially looking at plant and agricultural theft.

"And as things are now economically, I'm very aware of the fact our communities find it increasingly difficult having machinery taken from farms, which will make a real difference to their ability to get out and do their jobs.

"I am absolutely looking to develop our rural crime team."

What is your approach to assaults against officers?

She added: "Our officers do a really challenging role in exceptional circumstances.

"They attend incidents, often very chaotic, without all of the evidence available to them.

"They have to be able to work through that and for them to be assaulted in the course of it is unacceptable.

"As Chief Constable I will be wanting to support prosecutions against those people who do assault those seeking to protect people in our community."

How did the covid-19 pandemic affect the public's perception of emergency services and compliance with the law?

Chief Constable Blakeman said: "I think the vast majority of our communities are completely compliant with the legislation and the law and are good public citizens.

"I appreciate what a difficult and challenging time it was during covid - we were asking the public to refrain from doing things they were able to do every day of their life.

"I am hoping the position we took of trying to engage and explain really did assist in people's understanding and the greater good in terms of public protection was really understood."

READ MORE: 'It's been a huge honour to lead' North Wales Police for Chief Constable set to retire

Did the pandemic change policing itself, and if so - is it back to normal now, or has it become something else altogether?

She added: "It was a really unique time period when we saw changes to legislation on a temporary basis, and police were responsible for enforcing that.

"We tried to put the common sense approach around everything we did and we are now hopefully on a more stable footing.

"It certainly developed over time and challenged us.

"I like to think we ultimately worked through that together and came out the other side stronger."