Cheshire East is urging staff to report all incidents of violence and aggression from members of the public to protect themselves and fellow employees.

Since April this year there have been 21 reported incidents – 18 were classed as physical assault, aggressive or threatening behaviour and three related to verbal abuse or offensive language.

Last year there were 71 in total, with 57 in the former category and 14 in the latter.

The council believes many incidents go unreported and has drawn up a new violence and aggression policy, stressing the importance of staff disclosing all cases.

Jose Griffiths, head of audit risk and assurance, told Thursday's (October 2) meeting of the corporate policy committee, with regard to the under-reporting: "This [new policy] is a really valuable launch pad for us to remind staff that you might shake it off, but the next person to be in that situation may react very differently.

"It's almost a duty to your fellow colleagues to make sure that those incidents are picked up."

The service which has reported most incidents in the past few years is strategic transport and parking enforcement – although this has seen a significant reduction of reports from 65 three years ago, to 23 last year and four so far this year.

Cllr Mark Goldsmith (Wilmslow, Ind) said: "I wonder whether that coincides with the introduction of body cameras for the staff, which will give the evidence to show whether the line has been crossed into criminal activity.

"I know there were some high-profile cases that were taken to court at that time.

"Therefore, welcome that we prosecute wherever possible, wherever the evidence shows, as a matter of course."

Cllr Stewart Gardiner (Knutsford, Con) said: "If we've got a good policy that's well implemented, we can't prevent things happening, but we can make sure that our staff are as safe as possible in the circumstances that they are required to face."

The updated staff policy comes at the same time as the council is implementing measures to protect councillors from abuse and harassment.

Cllr Laura Crane (Sandbach, Lab) said: "Unfortunately, there is an unhealthy view of council officers in the public eye, along with councillors, that we are targets, and it is absolutely fine to abuse us, because we wear the council badge.

"So, I'm really glad to see this coming forward, because nobody should go to work thinking that abuse is just normal.

"We know that there are people out there who do feel that way in their roles, and I really hope that, with the work that goes on around this policy, people will feel confident to come forward and understand that they don't have to accept that on a daily basis."

The committee was unanimous in backing the policy.