SHOPKEEPERS on Wanstead High Street are calling for an increased level of supervision of the large groups of pupils that congregate after school finishes every weekday afternoon.

Businesspeople said large groups of school children from the nearby Wanstead High School still hang around for an hour or more every afternoon before going home, and drop litter, play football on the pavements and create an intimidating presence for the many elderly people living in the area.

Some said the situation had improved for a time, but over the last few months the problem had got worse as the level of supervision by Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) had tailed off.

Dill Singh, 40, works in The Art Shop, said elderly people could easily feel intimidated by large groups hanging around by benches and bus stops.

Mr Singh said: “They're not all bad kids, of course they're not, but there needs to be a police or teacher presence out there.

“They drop litter and make noise. I even saw a load of them playing football in the street once, right outside the shop.

“Wanstead is a nice area, we don't want it to go downhill and experience the same kinds of problems that places like Leyton and Stratford have.

“There's a opportunity here and they need to take it.”

Steve Alsop, who runs A G Dennis butchers, said that the behaviour of so many school children had so far deterred him from putting a bench outside the shop in memory of his father, who died just over a year ago after running the shop for several decades.

Mr Alsop said: “I'd like to put a bench out there for my Dad, but the kids wouldn't sit on it properly.

“You see some community police down here, but they don't do anything. During the winter you used to see some kids throwing snowballs at them, because they know they can't do anything.

“Once I saw a group of them standing around, leaning on a bin, and they actually dropped litter on the floor right next to it.

“That one outside now belongs to one of our best customers, Robin's Pie and Mash shop. They asked us to look after it for them.”

Jade Gracie, 26, works at Flora florists said she had seen incidents of anti-social behaviour and even petty theft first-hand.

She said: “We've had things stolen a few times. First one of them stole an outside plant, and then a few weeks later another one stole something and ran off with it and onto a bus.

“They just do it for the fun of it. Sometime you see community police down here but they don't pay any attention, they don't have any respect for them.”