WITH fighting, riots and all round anti-social behaviour hitting the national news this week, it's starting to feel like we have an epidemic of violence on our hands.

Closer to home, the behaviour of a few individuals in Otley and Arthington over the weekend has done nothing to show we are exempt from it. It is very easy to point the finger of blame but not so easy to find a solution.

And as we hear in the case of one Otley teenager, blaming the parents for a lack of effort, slapping on an anti-social behaviour order (ASBO) and putting someone in prison may not always be justified.

Which isn't to say that such individuals haven't made life difficult for the community, but isn't it a problem for the community to sort out rather than one family and the police?

With one teenager in prison, has the problem gone away? As Councillor Graham Kirkland (Lib Dem, Otley and Yeadon) said: "Prevention is better than cure. People blame the parents or the individual but that has nothing to do with it. We should be getting to these people before the problems start.

"Once you take one person out the equation, others will move into their place. And an ASBO creates the potential for that person to be victimised."

Perhaps it's time to start looking at why, rather than who, and what the community can do to resolve it.

There simply aren't the resources to slap 100 ASBOs on every wayward teenager, or to put every troublemaker in prison. The problem is national, but the solutions have got to come from a little closer to home.