A PROPOSED CCTV security camera system for towns in Kennet, including Devizes, could cost £700,000 to set up and up to £170,000 a year to run.

A feasability study, which was considered by Kennet Community Safety Partnership last week, includes a central control room, probably in Devizes, manned around the clock seven days a week.

In Devizes, seven pan, tilt and zoom pole-mounted cameras are suggested. They could be sited at the corner of Couch Lane and New Park Street, outside the cinema, and opposite the Corn Exchange in the Market Place, at either end of the Brittox, at the junction of Sidmouth Street and Maryport Street, and opposite Munnelly's Bar in Southbroom Road.

Kennet Community Safety Partnership has representatives of the police, Kennet District Council and members of parish councils.

The latest report was commissioned after the partnership declined to bid for Government funds set aside for new CCTV systems last year.

Kennet District Council has expressed concern it could be left to finance the cost of setting up and running a fully monitored system.

But businesses have clamoured for the introduction of a security camera system.

William Bohan-Pitt, managing director of The Stationery Cupboard in Devizes Market Place, said his shop window had been smashed twice in the past month.

He said: "The only way to stop vandalism is to have CCTV. Devizes Market Place would be better for it."

Philip Blanshard, proprietor of Johnson's the jewellers in Maryport Street, whose premises were the target of a daylight raid by a hammer-wielding robber a few weeks ago, also supports a CCTV system.

He said: "Because Devizes has no CCTV system, it is open season for thieves on town shops."