Mid-Suffolk PCC Public Meeting, 13th May 2015

Despite my interest in policing I've never been to a public meeting with the police before, at least not as a member of the public.  Perhaps I was just too scarred by the experience of being savaged in Islington in the 80s or frustrated in Bradford in the 90s while sitting on the other side of the table, but more that I didn't think I would want to put myself in a position which would probably just result in my sympathising with the speakers rather than the audience.

However, a less-than-satisfactory telephone encounter with Suffolk Constabulary earlier this week caused me to be looking at their website, and I saw that there was a meeting last night in Eye, the large village/small town just 3 miles away. Speaking were the Police & Crime Commissioner Tim Passmore, the Temporary Chief Constable Gareth Wilson and my local Inspector, Tristran Pepper.  So it was I arrived, early as usual, in the Community Centre car park waiting to play my part in feeding back community views on policing.

As is often the case, I found some humour in the situation straight away.  Four youths were, as I arrived, sitting on the playground equipment smoking.  Now it might have been that they could only afford the one cigarette and that was why they were passing round between them, but I suspect there may have been a less legal reason for it.  And while they certainly looked up (and stopped sharing) while first the Chief and then the Inspector walked into the building in uniform it didn't actually put an end to their fun.  How ironic, I thought, if someone were to mention youths taking drugs in public areas in the meeting about to begin.  I wasn't disappointed.

As the meeting began I looked around at my fellow participants.  Around 20 members of the community and a handful of staff from the PCC's office I guess.  A man videoing the meeting for later upload to the website and a lady serving the free teas and coffees. With biscuits. Our part of Suffolk is very rural and eyeing the public attendees I realised that all were 10 years or so older than me with the exception of a 40-something man in a tie sitting behind me who seemed quite organised, being in possession of some sort of PCC publicity material upon which he had made copious "black spider" notes.  I tried, mentally, to predict the issues to be raised.  Cynics in the Met always say that, whatever the crime situation, the public always complain about dog mess on the pavement.  I discounted this, if for no other reason than that the area actually has very few pavements, and put my imaginary bets instead on speeding, drugs use and visibility of police.

The meeting began pretty much on time and for once the audio and visual equipment worked flawlessly, at least after the PCC had found the button on his radio mic.  He started, inevitably running through the financial challenges facing the Constabulary, the changing demands it faced and reassuring us that he would not be "chucking other people's money at it".  Of course, not Mr. Passmore - you are a Conservative - we all know that is Labour's method.  There was a quick reinforcement of his view that he was right to refuse to amalgamate the Constabulary's Control Room with our neighbours in Norfolk - the one most contentious decision of his reign to date - although without offering any reason for his conviction.  Perhaps it has been all been done before; certainly nobody seemed to want him to expand. He ended by explaining that much research had been conducted on domestic violence and acknowledged that "the system does need improvement" and then touched on innovation, referring to an initiative titled "Evidence-based policing".  Which, I thought, didn't sound all that innovative - surely policing had been based on evidence for a very long time.  Or at least ought to have been?

The Chief was next. He has a pleasant and relaxed style which I warmed to.  He stressed the changing nature of demands, that "cyber-crime" and other new problems had largely filled the gaps in demand created by the fall in more traditional crime, hence the overall demand levels had changed, he said, very little.  He accepted that staffing levels would continue to fall and suggested that this could only be met by reducing calls for service, which would enable him to do a better job but with fewer resources.  He was keen to talk about serious and organised crime, the Eastern Area Specialist Operations Unit, Counter Terrorism unit, the ATHENA regional intelligence project, mobile working and body cameras.  I couldn't help but think that, as interesting and exciting as all that might be it was possibly a little beyond the issues that this audience was keen to explore.  The course of the discussion later confirmed this to me.  Lastly, and what was much more relevant was his desire to "understand the demand on the public sector in the county" - with a view to reducing demand by identifying duplication and overlap.  

The final presentation was Insp. Pepper, who ran us through the (improving) figures for victim satisfaction and reductions in anti-social behaviour and domestic burglary in the area. He was entirely reassuring and gave the clear impression that he was a man who cared about his role and succeeding in it.

So, on to questions from the floor.  First up a well-spoken man in the 'pole-position' seat, by the aisle in the front row.  He advanced his view that drugs were the root cause of all crime, and expressed his horror that he had recently heard there was heroin in the area.  The PCC sympathised, said that he personally loathed drugs and that it was the top priority of the policing plans, adding somewhat curiously that we should "rest assured that everything is being done that can be done, but we can always do more I suppose".  Eh?  A few more comments from the floor drew the expected and ironic reference to drug-taking in public areas and then the microphone was passed to the man behind me with the notes.  Who started eloquently but suddenly and without warning flew into a 'hang em and flog em' rant as to how all drug users were criminals and had to be treated as such, arrest them and prosecute them and it is problem solved. He used the phrase 'nail them' a number of times; I don't think he was actually advocating crucifixion but to be honest I don't think any of us was absolutely certain.  It was a very interesting point in proceedings for me - how would this largely senior, probably pretty conservative audience react?  I was a little surprised and quietly relieved that he received absolutely no support.  

A few references to policing hunts followed, from which I learned only that it is a subject which polarises opinion - as if we didn't know that.  And then on to speeding.  The Chief was, as throughout, calm and measured in his responses, explaining that the mobile speed cameras were not a cash cow, were sited so as to have the maximum impact and that Community Speed Watch schemes were expanding and successful.  A few eyebrows were raised when he said that on some rural roads it was difficult to enforce speed limits because it was dangerous to put officers there - due to the speed of passing traffic.........  He quickly qualified this by saying that of course it could be done but that the officers' safety had to be paramount.  We knew what he meant but it was just a slightly clumsy way of expressing it I suppose.

We went on with a discussion about 'eyes and ears' which enabled me to make my point about the difficulty of getting deployment decisions right; I was entirely happy that my feedback was well-received and will be taken into account. Those on the platform appeared to accept that new methods and processes were unlikely to be right first go and that adjustment would made where it was needed.  

The last point was made again by the man with the notes.  He started by apologising for his earlier rant, and in complaining about the lack of police visibility in the town of Stowmarket even made passing reference to Roy Jenkins and the Unit Beat scheme of the 1960s, before spoiling his apparently comprehensive knowledge and research by getting the year of the Brixton riots wrong and repeating an urban myth about the role played by local officers in it. Which upset me a little, but not as much as it did the pole-position drugs man, who stood up, turned round and forcefully accused notes man of monopolising the meeting and ruining it for everyone else,  High drama.

Except it wasn't quite the end, as the microphone then got passed to an elderly man who had so far remained silent, and who proceeded to ask the PCC a question about youth engagement.  Which was a little odd in that there had been scarcely a mention of this throughout the rest of the meeting.  The PCC though clearly relished the question and gave us a 5 minute run-through of the 3 initiatives he was working on in this area.  It was certainly a friendly question to ask him and actually made me wonder if it wouldn't have been better for the answer to have been delivered as a statement in the PCC's opening remarks.

That, then, is my factual report of the meeting.  In my next blog I will try to unpick a few of the issues it highlighted to me.

Emobilize - computer scam by internet and phone

I came across a genuine scam today which is worth passing on, especially to those who are not as computer-savvy as some.

A window pops up on your PC and says that you have loads of infections and your hard drive is about to expire irretrievably. It looks like it is a Microsoft pop-up. There is an 0800 number so you call it, it is free after all. A convincing Indian man will then explain the risk, say that he is from Microsoft and somehow put a piece of software called Remote Rescue or similar on your PC to analyse it. He will then tell you they can clean it for a price, in this case it was £300 by credit card. They then draw a few pretty patterns on your screen, tell you it is done and off you go. What then becomes of your credit card numbers is anybody's guess.

The company doing this call themselves E-mobilize, www.emobilize.net The number they use is 0800 0588121. They are run by 3 Indian nationals called Saurabh Basak Born Sep 1987; Muthuraja Mani Born Jul 1979 Shaswat Ravi Born 2Dec 1984. The company is registered to a very low rent accountancy firm called Husain Bulman & Co, 258 Merton Road London SW18 5JL. 

They process their payments through a firm called Pinnacle E-Serve who are run by another pair of Indians, Mrs. Shivani Jain Born Nov 1976 and Mr Sudhir Abba Born Oct 1970.

Enquiries continue, but please warn your friends and share as widely as possible.

Duty to Levi? - It's not right, but it's not surprising

Levi Bellfield found bullying the vulnerable easy.  He intimidated women and weaker men with his size, backed up by dreadful violence if it were needed.  But when it came to a more equal fight – such as when it kicked off in a club where he was working – he would be nowhere to be seen.  Perhaps one day the video we found of him supposedly ‘bare knuckle boxing’ will make its way on to You Tube, and the world can share the laughter we on the enquiry team burst into when we saw it.  ‘Bare-knuckle running away’ was a more accurate description.

So it is no surprise that he was assaulted and was unable to defend himself in Wakefield Prison.  There are some genuine hard men in there who, whatever they had done to be put away, were still decent enough to take exception to Bellfield killing young girls, beating up women and raping anyone he fancied.  It was only a matter of time before somebody took him on.  It isn’t right, but it also isn’t surprising.

Equally, it is completely understandable that the Prison Service chose to settle his claim. £4,500 is a tidy sum, but nothing like the amount they would have to spend on a full trial, even if they won.  The Service is just as cash-strapped as the rest of the Public Sector, and its bosses have to make business decisions, with sound economics winning over common sense morality.  And indeed £4,500 is drop in the ocean compared to the many millions the public purse has spent on trials already on Bellfield’s behalf.  You and I pay and the only winners are Bellfield and the lawyers.  It definitely isn’t right, but as distasteful as it might be, it also isn’t surprising. 

But if you want real proof that the whole system is messed up, look no further than the scale of compensation paid by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority to the families of murder victims.  For a single relative the maximum is £11,000, and for multiple relatives £5,500 each.  So, currently, the parents of Amélie Delagrange, Marsha McDonnell and Millie Dowler - who not only endured the loss of their daughters but the heartbreak of trials, of Bellfield sneering at them and having their lives dissected by his legal team – would each be entitled to just £1000 more than Bellfield has been given because the warders at Wakefield could not prevent him from getting a few scratches from a sharpened toothbrush.

And that is so not right as to be off the scale, and puts this whole ridiculous business of a duty of care being owed to monsters like Bellfield into a sickening perspective.

The Truth: Hurts.

Senior Investigating Officers make hundreds of decisions, most of which are actually of very little consequence.  Of the few that do really matter, some are surprisingly easy.  At least I suppose that many others will be surprised  that they are really what seem these days to be called ‘no brainers’. 

A strangely frequent no brainer is whether to secure some evidence of a serious crime in circumstances where it is obvious that the admissibility of that evidence might at some later date be called into question.  My thinking in these situations was pretty swift, and went along these lines:  If we don’t get the evidence now, we might not ever get it.  It won’t then be available at court.  If we get it but it is challenged, the learned Judge might exercise discretion against us, and we might lose it.  It won’t then be available at court.  But he or she might just let it in, and we will have it.  So let’s get what we can, and then let the court decide - the worst that might happen is that we end up in the same position we would have been in had we not secured it.  There is nothing to lose.  At least that was how it seemed.

But this thinking relied upon two principles which we took for granted, but which the shameful treatment of Detective Superintendent Steven Fulcher has now called into question.  First, our criminal justice system eschewed the American doctrine of ‘the fruit of the forbidden tree’.  Essentially, evidence which was obviously correct, which pointed to an incontrovertible objective truth, was admissible even if procedure had not been followed in unearthing it.  So a search without reasonable suspicion, without a warrant, even an irregular interview, were of no consequence if they yielded sound evidence.  Jurisprudentially, the concept of objective truth was accepted and it trumped whatever procedural niceties the Judges’ Rules or then the Police & Criminal Evidence Act threw up in the path that led to it.  Secondly we, the SIOs, knew that our first duty was to the community we served, and that we could justify decisions as being faithful to that duty without fear for our reputation, career or pension.  Which is how it should of course be, unless we want those who take the decisions in major investigations to be putting themselves before the people they have sworn to serve.

The awful and unwarranted predicament in which Steven Fulcher now finds himself has cast serious doubts on all this; doubts which have terrible implications for us all.  When confronted by a self-confessed murderer telling him of the location of a further victim, Mr. Fulcher had to take a decision.  But it was a no brainer.  He could comply with PACE, return to the station, and commence an interview, at some point after a solicitor had been summoned, advice given and the tape machine switched on.  If, as the result of advice, or a change of heart, “no comment” was the result, the opportunity to find a body, to resolve a case and most importantly to let a family know what had really happened to a loved one, would have been lost.  The alternative was to carry on, to strike while the iron was hot and allow the admission to be made and the body to be found.  On the basis that, if the suspect were to indicate the spot and the body to be found, it was pretty self-evident that the suspect knew a great deal about it, an objective truth would have been uncovered and the lack of strict procedural correctness therefore judged irrelevant.  Which is what Steven Fulcher did, and which – I hope – any SIO worthy of the name would have done.

I can just about understand the Judge’s ruling that the evidence of the second murder is inadmissible.  I do not agree with it, however I am sure he was applying the law faithfully as he saw it.  But what I cannot fathom is the decision - presumably taken by the top team within Wiltshire Police - to suspend Steven Fulcher and call in the IPCC.  Because SIOs are going to take note and inevitably factor their own career prospects in to similar decisions in future, to the detriment of victims, their families and the community.  Which will equally inevitably mean bodies not found, crimes not solved and victims not satisfied.

Police Officers who take money, who falsify evidence, who are too lazy to act, who use excessive force – these are the ones who should be suspended, investigated and dealt with.  Those like Steven Fulcher, who do the best they think they can, honestly, in a considered manner and prioritising the interests of victims and the community, should be applauded, not suspended.

The pen is mightier than the sword

Or, updating the adage for the 21st century, the computer is mightier than the gun.

Arming every officer, even if it were logistically possible, even if they were all suitable (which it isn't, and they aren't) would not prevent tragedies such as we saw yesterday. Policing is a risky business at the sharp end, and where a madman does things so far off the scale of reasonableness and predictability the risks are impossible to eradicate.  And to alter the essential character of our policing to such an extent in the hope that it might help is, sadly, simply not worth it.

But what we must do, what the leaders of our Police Service are duty-bound to do, is to take every possible step to make sure that our policing of our communities by consent is safe.  In this context that means making sure that every single piece of information and intelligence which might help inform officers attending every call for help is available to them and those who direct them.

There is a long-standing issue with the dissemination of information gleaned from major investigations, which few forces, if any, have come to terms with.  Typically, a force will have three computer systems relevant to this issue - Command and Control, which logs calls for help, who is responding, how the incident is dealt with and the result; an intelligence database where information, graded for reliability, is kept in cross-referenced indices with entries relating to persons, vehicles, premises and locations; and the HOLMES (Home Office Large Major Enquiry System) database upon which every piece of information relating to major investigations is kept in discrete accounts.

The Command and Control system has a facility whereby as an incident log is created any flags attached to the address entered will be displayed.  These may relate to the occupiers or the location and are essential for the dispatching officer to make an informed decision as to the risk to officer safety.  In some forces these flags still have to be entered manually whilst in others information will be copied across from the intelligence system automatically.  But of course even in the latter cases, manual entry on to the intelligence system is required, so there is a dependence on somebody, somewhere, deciding that the information is worth recording.  The ultimate systems might be where the Command and Control logs themselves automatically write back to the intelligence system, but the issues of duplication and data standardisation here are proving difficult to overcome.

At a divisional level intelligence staff are pretty good at updating the Command and Control database. But it all becomes a bit murky when you start to try to include HOLMES. Culturally it has taken some years to arrive at the position where detectives investigating the most serious of crimes have accepted the necessity to put everything they do, see, hear and take possession of on to 'The System', that is, to record it on the HOLMES database. The additional burden of separately submitting an intelligence report for the different database seems to have been taken on only by the more conscientious and far-sighted officers.  Despite repeated efforts it has not been possible, to my knowledge, to arrive at a reliable means of achieving the automatic transfer of information from HOLMES to an intelligence database, certainly not in a foolproof and operationally sound way. So we are left to rely upon the judgment of individual intelligence officers attached to major enquiry teams, who have as a priority the gathering of information for dissemination to their team and perhaps understandably therefore are frequently too busy to push information out from the team to the wider force in any comprehensive or reliable manner.  I doubt there is a Senior Investigating Officer past or present who has not wrestled with this problem, tried to address it but ended up uneasy that it has never really been solved.

Why is all this relevant?  Because the fact that there is a vast mass of useful intelligence lying dormant in HOLMES accounts across the country means, generally, that opportunities to solve or prevent crime, and to mitigate risks to officers, are not available to those who would like to take advantage of them.  Because, I fear, it is very likely that despite the huge external and internal publicity generated by Greater Manchester Police in the hunt for Cregan, there will be information in the HOLMES account that would have led to his capture had it been available to a wider audience. Or, more devastatingly perhaps, which would have linked Cregan somehow, maybe through a few degrees of separation, with the house in Abbey Gardens.

This piece is written not to criticize nor carp, but rather to offer a suggestion at a time when all of us, especially those who have worn the uniform, are hurting. It is extremely difficult, extremely unpalatable.  But it would be some additional respect to the memories of Fiona Bone and Nicola Hughes if their painful loss were to inspire each and every police officer and staff member to ensure that every conceivable snippet of information they acquire is shared as widely as it can be. Computers, not guns, ought to be giving our dedicated frontline officers the increased safety they deserve, but as ever, they can only be as good as the information they are fed.

The Enfield Crime Squad. Allegedly.

Allegedly. Was the word really even in common use before Have I Got News For You? I'm not sure it was, and I am equally sure that it is not one I have regularly had recourse to. But that was then, and this is now. One of the difficulties in commenting from afar rather than knowing from the thick of it is that I have to rely on information which I cannot completely verify. So all of this post is, as usual, what I think, but what I think in this case is based upon things I have heard and been told, but which I do not know for sure to be accurate. So just think 'allegedly' before you read each paragraph and we should be fine.

It was only a few years ago, maybe 10 or 15 at most, when Enfield, the Borough of my birth and childhood, was treated with a little disdain within the Police. Those of us fortunate (!) enough to work in the tougher neighbouring Borough of Haringey thought they had it easy there. No real crime, no real public order, nice people who made you cups of tea. Didn't the main radio set in Yankee 5 have a snooze button?

As inner London's problems migrated ever-outwards, after the turn of the century it became obvious that there were no soft Boroughs in the Met any more, and Enfield was no exception. What had been a cosy posting for years suddenly became populated by gangs, robbery and violence. As the Borough rose to the top of the Met's murder charts Edmonton became known as 'Shank Town', while one street earlier this year was still rejoicing in the nickname 'Stab Alley'.

Somebody within the local police presumably thought enough was enough, that the growing gangs and rising crime rates were unacceptable and that tough action was required. How this was devised and 'operationalised' (see - I learnt some spectacular made-up words in the Met) I am not sure, and is pretty much irrelevant. The outcome was that the Borough Crime Squad was, by 2009, the most successful in the capital. Its arrest and conviction rates were high, crime rates were falling. Robust and effective enforcement, combined with practical cooperation with the local authority to prevent crime, was slowly turning the tide and making the Borough a palpably better place to live and work in.

The senior officers in Enfield were apparently aware of the Crime Squad's methods and gave at least tacit approval to them. And why wouldn't they, given the successful results? There was no question of anything illegal taking place, and certainly no question of personal enrichment or gain for the officers involved. They were, it has been suggested to me, a bunch of good young coppers, working hard to put away criminals and make their Borough a safer place.

One of their more unusual practices was to use property seized from their criminals. There is no suggestion this was for any purpose other than to make their jobs easier - for example, seized vehicles may have been used to conduct observations from, mobile phones used within the office to make covert or unattributable calls, TV sets to view CCTV recordings. Essentially, goods which might ordinarily have sat in a storeroom or compound pending a trial were used to help the fight against those who had stolen them, or bought them with illicit funds.

Now somebody took exception to this. Reports have described her or him as a 'whistleblower'. I think this is unfair and misleading. Most of us will understand that term as a co-worker reporting malpractice. That is far from what happened in Enfield; it seems that to a man and woman the operational officers and staff within the Borough were supportive of the Crime Squad - and why wouldn't they have been, given the real benefits the community was deriving from them. The so-called whistleblower in this case was, it seems, a support-worker from a central department outside of the Borough, who decided to tell their own boss about it, for either personal or professional reasons.

This led to an investigation which found very little evidence of wrongdoing, and was petering out when it was decided to search the Crime Squad's base (as well as the homes of 14 officers). It was this search, in February 2009, which uncovered the now infamous 'hard-stop' video from some 8 months previously. An incident about which, I believe, no complaint of malpractice was made at the time by the young criminal who was the subject of the arrest. With renewed vigour the honorary Detectives of the Met's Directorate of Professional Standards set about building a case, and went to interview a number of criminals who the Crime Squad had convicted. One of these alleged that his head had been held over a sink of water during his arrest, though video footage of the arrest seems to show him completely dry throughout. This allegation, somehow, was leaked to the media - possibly through somebody connected with the Metropolitan Police Authority - as 'waterboarding' and the whole thing gained an unexpected and unwarranted momentum.

Around this time also the Crime Squad received an anonymous tip-off that a lock-up garage had a stash of stolen goods. They rightly got a warrant and indeed discovered a veritable Aladdin's Cave. All the electrical gear was properly seized, and enquiries to trace its owners began. This proved pretty simple, as there were serial numbers and other markings which quickly led the officers to a hire company, who were as bemused by the enquiry as the officers were by their reply. The equipment wasn't stolen, indeed it was all being leased by the Metropolitan Police - from an address where many of the D.P.S. teams are based. Presumably this ham-fisted attempt at a sting had been intended to prove the corruption of the Crime Squad officers. Instead, I am told, since they had properly recorded all the goods and then proceeded to try to trace their owners, it just proved their honesty.

I have no idea how much the lease of this stash of electric gear cost, but it is presumably a drop in the ocean in the context of the overall cost of the investigation into the Enfield Crime Squad. Figures bandied in the press today range between £5 million to more then £12 million. And while we may not have heard the last of it, all it seems to have uncovered is a few officers whacking a car - which had been stolen in an aggravated (that is, with weapons and/or violence) burglary, in order to arrest the driver who had at least dishonestly handled the car, and was driving whilst disqualified.

Which they shouldn't have done with baseball bats - though presumably if they had used officially-issued batons or asps would have been OK. I say that because one has only to watch one of the plethora of 'PoliceCameraActionTrafficCopsWithCameras' programmes on any number of Freeview channels any evening of the week to understand that it is a common tactic used by officers at the end of pursuits. And perfectly lawful and justified, we are told, because of the need to shock the driver into instant submission before the car, or indeed any other object, can be used as a weapon. Which is presumably what one might expect an aggravated burglar to do, that being the sort of person the officers had every reason to suspect to be driving the car.

So, a little 'over-aggressive' (the Met's own words) policing is discovered at this huge cost. I have enough family and friends, outside of the police, who still reside in Enfield to gauge the feeling there. They were mightily glad that such robust and decisive policing was going on in their community. I imagine the practices have been changed somewhat; I don't know how Enfield's crime and detection figures are looking as a result.

But what I do know is that we are staring, pan-London and indeed nationally, at a reduction in police numbers due to budgetary constraints. It is a reasonable approximation to call the annual cost of a new Constable £50,000 when one adds up salary, training and equipment. Which means we could get 100 PCs for £5 million or 240 PCs for £12 million. Makes you think, doesn't it? Allegedly.

It's about more than just cuts

This post is too long for a tweet, but may be quite short for a blog. I just want to present an idea of a different perspective on the police cuts debate.

Overall, I am a supporter of cutting public expenditure; there is no alternative given the horrible state Messrs. Brown and Darling left us in. And I have some notion of equality which says that what needs to be done must be done without exception, the police included.

That said, I do not want to see policing quality reduced - I am not sure how far it can fall anyway whilst still being worthy of the name. I quite understand the associations, commentators and Opposition MPs seizing the opportunity from the last week's events to make a case for stopping the cuts but I have little faith they will succeed. Or at least there is a distinct opportunity that they won't.

Why not then also have a Plan B; using the same facts, the same public opinion and the same fear as to the future to campaign for something which might be much more achievable. That would be shifting the focus from palliatives to prosecutions, from counselling to conviction - indeed, using what became a dirty word in policing around 15 years ago, but one used in the House by David Cameron today, from Service back to Force.

This, I think, would include, but not be limited to:

• Restoring the right of a Custody Officer to authorise charges - saving thousands in CPS lawyers' wages and ensuring that many more of the guilty actually face a court

• Strict guidelines on when a criminal can be cautioned - and how often

• Repeal or wholesale modification of the our Human Rights Act - not, as promised by the Government, trying to get it changed at source by amending the ECHR - to prevent some of its perverse effects

• Removing all targets for detections, which skew activity away from what might be needed

• Exempting Police Forces from the provisions of the Health & Safety legislation, reversing the dreadfully paralysing effects of the Met's corporate conviction

I am sure there are many other measures which would help, these are rather off the cuff, but you get the idea.

Essentially, the Government, Opposition and certainly the public as a whole are asking for more robust policing. Those in the fortunate position of being able to lobby at this time should not be blinkered by the cuts. Concentrating solely on them gives the Associations the appearance of a Trades Union, concerned with the well-being of their members above all else. Police Officers are better than that; they should grab the chance to make a real difference to policing - and thus to the communities they serve - so that some lasting good can at least be born out of the terrible last few days.