Just said on the VT, Kosh posted same link

Given that the current incumbent is just keeping the seat warm until his next boss can be found I doubt very much whether any useful analysis will come from anything that happened this week and any money wasted on any amount of enquiries could just as easily be spent asking the law enforcers who were actually on the streets on Sun/Mon what they think could have been done better - the story of the six police officers (only two with riot shields) defending a retail park from a mob of 40 or 50 rioters could probably be repeated across the capital, numbers are always available only in standby, sitting waiting in side streets in a van otherwise you are just guessing where to send them, our policing is re-active and not pro-active for re-active is much cheaper, by far.

But it was you who said that “the police were unable to field enough officers on the streets on Monday” and that the extra 10,000 were “miraculously found” after the PM returned from holiday. Are you know agreeing with me that it was the Police who got it 100% wrong?


McLaren_Field wrote: ...........”the same cuts that meant that the police in London were unable to field enough officers on the streets on Monday night but had miraculously found an extra 10,000 bodies for the following night after Shiny Dave arrived home from holiday and began beating his chest in Tarzan stylee.”



But I didn’t suggest that did I? I said there were many areas of waste that could be tackled first and gave one example of where to make a start.

The example you give highlights and underlines my point about waste. The police should not be buying expensive top of the range foreign cars to chase speeding motorists. What a waste of budget and a wrong priority. This is a low priority and highlights my point that the police have lost focus on their main duty: ie To make our towns and cities safe, and to protect the public and property.





But the bobbies are not normally on the beat. You assume these 6000 you mention would have been on the streets any way. It is most likely they would have been snugly sitting in twos in their fleet of cars or filling in paperwork in the station.

You are still calling this civil unrest when the majority was blatant petty crime committed by gangs of youths who had no respect for the police as they knew from the TV pictures that they had got the tactics wrong and were unable to adapt. Are you saying it takes 1000's of riot police to catch a bunch of hoodies?

As I previously stated we certainly do need extra bobbies on the beat in a more preventive role. But IMO we need less highly trained officers sitting at desks and perhaps even less detectives as they rarely detect anything. Most crime remains unsolved and the successes usually come from either CCTV or the public.

But lets return to the proposed cuts to the police budget. You like “dead Ed Milliband” love to scare by stating there are 20% cuts. You then equate this 20% with front line police manpower and come up with misleading numbers.

The proposed cuts are due to start in 2012/13 with 8%. In 2014 the proposal is for a further 6% saving with 4% for the following 2 years.

You also fail to point out that Ministers say only 12 per cent of police are ever on "front-line duty" at any time and there are substantial backroom savings to be made.

Most business people will say that you have a reasonable chance to make 10% savings pa in business without effecting efficiency. In public service where there is not the profit motivation to drive efficiency so there is a greater prospect of achieving even higher savings.

In these days of an ongoing world financial crisis where more and more countries are having to accept some form of austerity to bring down debt, for us to fail to try to make serious attempts to make savings to budgets is not just naïve but gross irresponsibility with regard to the future generations that will have to pick up the tab.

None of us wants a poorer level of public service but as the NHS has proven just to throw money at it does not work. We can make savings and still have our services and we must try very hard to achieve this.

Too many with vested interests are lined up aginst even making a try at savings. A glance at what is happening in the rest of the world would show the disasterous alternatives that could face us.

I thought all your family were into cake?

Quote ="tvoc"Let the battle continue: www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/cr ... 36852.html Even Maggie knew not to tangle with the thin blue line.'" But todays' plod, particularly the Met are a accident prone bunch with a succession of dogy senior officers/commissioners. So if they insist on playing politics rather than policing they could be out of their depth their too!

Quote ="tvoc"Let the battle continue: www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/cr ... 36852.html Even Maggie knew not to tangle with the thin blue line.'" But todays' plod, particularly the Met are a accident prone bunch with a succession of dogy senior officers/commissioners. So if they insist on playing politics rather than policing they could be out of their depth their too!

Fully agree with this and your previous well argued points BillyR

Prime Minister Cameron is enlisting the advice of Bill Bratton. Labour have already been there and done that and it was Jack Straw the coined the phrase associated with Bratton in this country.

IIRC he was given an increased budget, a notable increase in visable police numbers, an adoption of zero tolerance tactics and the incarceration of large numbers of criminals, some for fairly petty crimes.

Absolutely none of the above are likely to carry much favour with this liberal leaning government in austerity Britain (or with the current court system) and where exactly is Ken Clarke (justice minister) with his don't lock 'em up, rehabilitation agenda? Or has he gone to ground never to return after his 'serious rape' remarks.

It wasn't so long ago that legislation was being tightened up on the use of CCTV in our city centres and now it's proving it's absolute worth in assisting the police to arrest the looters and rioters rampaging through those same shopping precints.

The messages coming out of government appear to be either contradictory, confused or incompetent or perhaps a combination of all three.

As you probably already know, the extra 10000 bodies on the street came from a combination of cancelling everyone's leave and of borrowing officers from other forces and transporting them in to London, neither of which are long term options, nor cheap options.

Presumably when you book your holidays at work you get to take them on the appointed date and don't have your boss on the phone telling you to cancel them and he can't tell you when you can take them again ?

As for the budgets, if you are convinced that a 20% budget cut can be made without affecting any front line service then congratulations, you've swallowed the potion and you are now a believer, you'll probably find that all but one county police chief constable disagrees with you though, on the other hand they could probably make the total saving just by driving a Mondeo couldn't they, in fact hang on, why does a chief constable need a car anyway...

You seem surprised but when the need arises it has always been the case - so why the big fuss now and why the delay in deployment?




I run my own business so I usually fit in after everyone else and am happy to accept this. However when I was an employee I accepted the terms of the appointment and didn’t complain afterwards.. When joining the police (or military) you accept these terms as part of the package, like they accept an excellent sickness and pension scheme and early retirement, so no more grumbles on this score please.




By now even you should have accepted that the proposed 20% budget cuts are spread over 4/5 years. As I previously said any business person with the faintest knowledge of running a budget will know that savings can almost always be made. The private sector is continually looking for savings. The larger the organization the more the potential savings.

For public services that have had an extended period of over a decade of increased budgets and manpower are now without doubt able to increase efficiency and make substantial savings. So the first cut of 8% planned for 2012/13 is entirely possible. Do you really believe that an 8% saving to such a huge budget is not possible without effecting front line policing bearing in mind that only 12% of officers are on front line duties at any one time?

To ensure that there is no reduction of officers on front line duty (indeed we should try to increase numbers) a full review of police practices needs undertaking as the problem runs deeper.

The Met has had an obsession with a softer form of neighbourhood policing which some well regarded former senior officers say helps to explain why Britain’s biggest police force seemed unable to muster sufficient numbers of riot control officers at short notice. The Met used to pride itself on its ability to bring in 3000-6000 officers into central London at very short notice.

Importantly all these officers received at least basic training in riot control. But the introduction of neighbourhood policing meant that a large proportion of this standby element comprised community support officers who had little or no riot training and no legal powers of arrest. Around 2007 the standby mechanism was quietly abandoned because it was perceived as draining resources from neighbourhood policing.

This same emphasis on neighbourhood policy also contributed to its failure to tackle the growth in “complex criminal communities” So we now have had an explosion of these criminal gangs so that we now a threat to the broader safety of society. Some 170 gangs have been identified in London alone. It is time the police changed their focus.

With regard to the comments of various police chiefs – well they would say that wouldn’t they? This does not prove they are right though does it? In fact you could argue that considering these same police chiefs get so many police decisions wrong they are unlikely to get budgeting matters right either as it is outside their expertise!

With regard to cars. Whats wrong with a Ford? And why should the police drive around in top of the range BMW’s with leather seats?

It would be interesting to break down the police budget:

eg: Cost & numbers of officers actually on duty each day. Costs to show overtime and vehicle costs.

Front line duties uniform
Front line duties CID
Community/Neighbourhood duties
Support duties
Office duties
Traffic duties
Off sick & gardening leave
On holiday
Civil staff
Cost of properties and maintenance.
Vehicle costs and maintenance for each section

As part of the post mortem on this serious public criminal disorder we need a root and branch review of current policing methods and priorities and not just a discussion on proposed budget cuts

Well thats you and David Cameron who seem to think that you can easily cut 20% from a budget and yet actually increase services (as he is calling for today), I wish him well for it could be his Waterloo.

William Bratton is of the opinion that "arrests won't solve the issue" and part (if not all) of his solution is more of what you may call "softer policing", specifically the recruitment of a more ethnically/racially balanced police force to interact with local communities better.

How he will do this with no budget and a freeze on recruitment these past two years is unknown, Mr Cameron has already made it abundantly clear that there is to be no backtracking on the budget.

Yes, I suppose they would, if I want an opinion on policing I'd probably ask a chief constable rather than a career politician, but thats just stupid me.

So pretty much the same way Sir Norman and the West Yorkshire plod have been going in recent years then? Interesting that London, Birmingham and Manchester all saw widespread civil unrest, yet Leeds (where community policing has been given a major push, particularly in areas with a high ethnic minority population) seemed to escape relatively unscathed.

More Specials ?

Which section of society is "socially deprived" and what does that mean anyway?

My view is that what happened was down to spontaneous outbursts of pure criminality/greed. Those sections of society you generalise include members of the same communities that rallied against and suffered at the hands of the rioters.

The young Islamic boys killed defending their mosque probably suffered the same social deprivation as the rioters.

Not just me and the PM. Most business people would accept 20% over 4/5 years is quite reasonable particularly for a public service that has had a a long run of getting what they want.

We have just had an example of what softer policing can achieve. It has allowed 170 criminal gangs to flourish in London alone. I am sure this wake up call for the Met will bring about a much needed refocus on priorities.



The new government has only been in power for 18 mths and the proposed police budget cuts start in 2012/13

But whose opinion do you ask when the police senior officers get things so badly wrong?

Yes, the focus is to bring in a "specialist" who is making it quite clear what his solution is - a type of policing which integrates with the local ethnic mix and not one that goes around cracking heads, this will of course mean recruiting more officers of the correct ethnicity which in itself is always controversial, moreso if extra funding and fast tracking is made available for these (as it will have to be) - that is of course if David Cameron is serious about applying the LA and New York solutions to gang crime and not just using Bratton as a posturing platform.

I couldn't care less who enforced the initial police freeze on recruitment, party political love-ins aren't my bag, the era of Red vs Blue politics are long gone with barely enough room to slip a rizla paper between the three parties.

You ask them for the facts and you listen to their explanations and assess their options and consider whether you tied their hands some years ago - you certainly don't jump in with both feet two days after the event and start a "It was all their fault" campaign as some MP's are happy to do.

It was only a few short months ago that the Met were under criticism for their procedure known as "kettling" when violent disorder was seen on the streets, pressure from MPs which brought a promise not to use that procedure again - there is nowhere else to go when your hands are tied in that way.

I think you will find the "specialist" will have some other tougher ideas as well.

I don't think we have a police force that goes round cracking heads, but already we are hearing that there is a need for the Met to re-focus which is what I have been saying. If the ethnic balance of officers in the Met (and elswhere) is still wrong after so much history then this is just another example of the need for a change in direction for our biggest police force.




If this were really so then we would be hearing from you much more balanced political opinions than we do.

Look, as I have stated several times, I think the police have a very difficult job to do and by and large the public (including myself) are right behind them. I saw nothing wrong with "kettling" as a means of protecting the public. I agree too much is done on the hoof without calm thought.

MP's do have a mandate to express opinions which often represent their constituents so long as it doesn't undermine the police.

Having said all that, we all did see a cock up by the police and the acting commissioner has had the decency to admit they got it wrong for the first few days.

The public also have the right to point out serious errors when and where they occur. The police lost control of the streets where murder, theft and mayhem occured. We have to urgently make sure this cannot happen again and the police have to prove to the public that they will never again just stand by and watch serious, violent criminal behaviour happening on this scale for so long.

The criminal gangs are now a real serious problem and current police methods to stop them has failed.

Tackling the reasons for the behaviour will take much, much more time as we have deep seated, long standing social problems to address.

Im not sure why people think that the 'social deprivation' and 'pure criminality/greed' argument are mutually exclusive.

My personal theory is that people choose to be part of a society, they choose to adhere (in the most part) to its rules and its norms. Conversely they sometimes choose not to. In this case, people chose not to. Yes what they did was pure criminality, there was no protest in it, and yes it was greed, you dont make a point by stealing high-end electrical goods and trainers other than you like high-end electrical goods and trainers, but the question we should be asking is why now? why have these people (and lets not pretend it is all a criminal underclass, it wasnt, it was a wide range of people from diverse backgrounds) now chosen, at this point, not to adhere to societies rules and norms?

As for 'who' is socially deprived? Huge sections of society are. Not just the poor 'chavs' on sink estates, but many young people from middle class families, families David Cameron would describe as good, hard working, honest, parents. Good role models and all that jazz.

The reality is, for a lot of young people, they simply dont have the opportunities to follow their role models. The average house price is a ridiculous multiple of the average wage, especially for a young person. The cost of a university education now is 6 times what my dad paid for his first house in the mid-80's, and kids and young people cant go in to a trade or into industry because the jobs and apprenticeships simply arent there. It is very very difficult, and only getting harder and harder for kids to become young adults and start to take, and contribute to this society. It is exceptional these days for a kid to leave school, get a career, get a good wage, be able to afford a house, a car and a decent standard of living. The police force who do and have treated kids who protest and kids in general with a profound lack of respect, authority figures who themselves have far from clean faces, Police officers taking bribes, the media offering them, MP's taking what they can in expenses (and other stuff) big business which has economically raped about 3 different generations. These are people being told that they will need to pay of billions to keep banks afloat so other people dont lose their savings, when they spend their lives living in their overdraft from paycheque to paycheque or dole cheque to dole cheque wishing they had savings to lose.

Im not saying what happened was right or trying to mitigate it, im just saying im not surprised people said f@ck it, by hook or by crook im going to take what I want, everyone else is doing it, and Im also saying that if we dont address these fundamental problems then I wont be surprised when it happens again and again.

Utter rubbish. Which businesses have cut by 20% whilst increasing the service they provide?

If it's that simple then how about you detail where these cuts can be made which won't affect front-line policing?

Thats not what he's telling the press to date, Camerons first response was to make an appointment with the man who is recognised as having eased (not cured) the gang problems in LA and New York and in doing so he lets rip with a lot of rhetoric about getting tough, about being old enough to face the consequences etc etc - and the first thing that his advisor starts telling the press is that you can't arrest your way out of the gang culture and you have to work with those kids not against them.

Someone is not singing off the same hymn sheet and if Cameron truly is going to pay attention to this guy then he needs to ease off the tough talk and wait and see what he has to say, there are huge swathes of voters who are now looking for long prison sentences and council house evictions and when they don't happen they are going to be looking at David and wondering why he's stopped talking tough.




I don't keep score, I simply comment where I see fit, as someone who was raised under the influence of Wilson and Heath I view all politicians today as mere shadows of the men they used to be to the extent where I don't even care about which colour flag my own MP sails under as long as he proves that he works for me, which the current incumbent did.