Hampstead PCSOs were giving out free bottles of the burglary deterrent Smart Water on Thursday.

Ward community support officers PCSO Naomi Francis and PCSO Lee Jefferies spent their morning at the Hampstead Community Centre in the high street offering advice on how to prevent burglaries and signing passers-by up to the property-marking system.

PCSO Francis told this newspaper: "This little bottle is a gem. We're giving them out to make people feel safer and to get the stickers up as a deterrent."

At the community centre, Sarah Bradley, who works as a nanny in West Hampstead and Hampstead, added: "We are always out and about and lots of nannies have had things like phones taken by the likes of people on the mopeds."

The officers were also giving out crime protection advice.

Smart Water enables members of the public to mark their property with a unique code that will relate back to them should an item be stolen.