First Blackpool. Now Bath. Around Britain Bluetooth is fast becoming an inexpensive substitute for the boys in blue.

Back in July police in the North West’s leading leisure resort proclaimed that using the technology would help them catch criminals and prevent crime.

Having acquired four laptops for the purpose, officers intended to send unsolicited messages to anybody carrying a Bluetooth enabled mobile within a 300 metre radius.

Recipients would be shown photos of missing persons, given warnings to protect their property, and asked if they had witnessed any high-profile offences. 

Two months later, and no evidence has yet appeared to suggest such spamming of residents and visitors has proven successful.

However, rather than wait, Bath & North East Somerset Council have decided to launch a similar scheme, this time to combat city centre anti-social behaviour.

According to a report in the Bath Chronicle, Bluetooth will be used to remind people in the city centre to have consideration for local residents, and keep the noise down. Should they fail to do so, they will be warned, they could get an £80 police fine.

Tim Harris, the anti-social behaviour co-ordinator at the Council, believes this to be an up-to-date way of communicating with 18 to 30 year olds.

He hopes Bluetooth messaging “will make people think about their behaviour and act responsibly.”

Of course, why the Council should employ somebody to co-ordinate anti-social behaviour rather than prevent it is not explained.

But let us not worry about logic.

Similarly, let us not waste time attempting to discover how the Council will prevent such messages being received by those over 30, or those quietly minding their own business without causing any offence. The fact is, they cannot.

Instead let us visualise some inebriated youthful carouser initially attempting sufficient coordination to access such a message and then, in the unlikely event they should succeed, being able to focus for long enough to assimilate its contents.

Not really very probable.

Even so the Council claim that over the August Bank Holiday no fewer than 140 mobile phone users read the messages. Unfortunately they omit to mention is whether any of those individuals had been behaving anti-socially.

Perhaps sensitive to possible criticism, coordinator Harris told the BBC: “It's not just about telling people 'you can't do this and you can't do that’.

“It’s very much about giving out information for their own personal safety.”

Somewhat patronisingly he explained: “You've got to remember that in Bath right now we have a lot of young people coming to university for the first time.

“They're coming into town and maybe staying out later than they would in their home towns - they can be very vulnerable and it's about getting that message across.”

As some Bath residents have been quick to comment, rather than wasting tax-payers’ money on anti-social behaviour coordinators and spamming the local populace, the Council might achieve better results ensuring there were more police patrolling the streets.

Whether doing something on the cheap is better than doing nothing at all is open to question.

What is certain is such initiatives are no substitute for effective policing.