The Thin Blue Line

POLICE CRIME STATISTICS - ARE WE CLOSE TO EXPOSING THE TRUTH?

2013-05-17T01:37:00.002-07:00

Tom Winsor, HM Chief Inspector of Constabulary, said he wanted to review how police forces record crimes amid concerns officers are deliberately changing statistics

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/10057427/Police-could-be-fiddling-crime-figures-watchdog-warns.html

At last there seems to be some traction building behind the need to investigate the way police record crime.

Tom Winsor, HM Chief Inspector of Constabulary, said he wanted to review how all the country's police forces record crimes amid concerns officers are deliberately changing statistics.

The review will examine claims that police officers recorded fewer serious offences than the crimes that had actually been alleged.

Examples included theft being recorded as lost property, violence with injury being recorded as common assault and burglary being classified as theft in a dwelling.

The inspectorate would also look into suggestions that some officers would get prisoners to confess to crimes they had not committed in order to boost clear-up rates.

Mr Winsor addressing the Home Affairs select committee said: "The figures are critical to a whole range of decisions which elected officials, chief constables and others must make. Information is the oxygen of accountability and the information must be sound.”

Mr Winsor added: “There have been anxieties expressed in relation to the quality of crime data statistics. We will be doing an all-force inspection of the integrity of crime recording by the police and we will report on it when we have done it.”

He said the review would look at “circumstances where crimes are incorrectly recorded or not recorded as crimes but are recorded as incidents”. (THIN BLUE LINE have been exposing this for a number of years).

He added: “It is alleged that from time to time police officers who are eager to improve their clear-up rates will all go to a prison and get some people who are already in prison to confess to crimes they did not commit, the ‘taken into considerations’.

Regular visitors to these pages know that we have not only been protesting about the scandal of police cooking the books of crime for many years, but we have also provided detailed reports of precisely how this is being done.

There is more than anecdotal evidence, there is officer evidence and detailed hard evidence to prove how the statistics are regulalrly fudged and manipulated. Chief Officers must be held to account for this. Whether they have constructed the systems that fiddle the numbers, condoned the actions or merely turned a blind eye to the practices, it is ONLY THEY who have benefitted from this distortion and manipulation. It is ONLY THEY who received exhorbitant bonus payments down the years (payments that make the MP Expenses Scandal appear small stuff by comparison), to reflect crime reductions and detection increases. It is ONLY THEY who have advanced their careers and political ambitions on the back of this disgraceful deception. It is the general public who are being conned, the rank and file who have lost faith in their superiors.

Most recently, in the same week the recent crime statistics were released, Chief Superintendent Irene Curtis, President of the Superintendents Association, showed integrity and courage lacking in her colleagues when she admitted that the service was ridden with the Gaming or Statistical fiddling culture. See the links below that refer.

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/scrap-targets-restore-common-sense.html

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/crime-down-again-or-emperors-new-clothes.html

Confidence in the police has fallen to an all time low, along with officer morale. It is the senior officers who must shoulder the responsibility for this, stand up and be counted, restore honesty and probity to the numbers. Start again if you must, but this CANNOT be allowed to continue.

Home Secretary, Theresa May should display the same concern and awareness that this subject needs by instigating a root and branch exposure of what is going on. Probity must be restored to the numbers so rank and file officers no longer fear the damage to their integrity as officers and the true picture of crime in the UK can be exposed.

As recently as Monday of this week, the Police Federation Chairman stepped out of the shadows to add his voice to the debate:-

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10052668/Police-ordered-to-slant-crime-data.html

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/police-federation-chief-admits-crime.html

Latest statistics reveal an eight per cent drop in police recorded crime in England and Wales for the year to September 2012, but for the first time the Office for National Statistics has raised doubts about the accuracy of police figures.

Officials suggested that police could have left up to 400,000 offences off the books in recent years because of the ‘pressures’ to meet targets.

Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: ‘Fewer crimes are being solved, fewer criminals caught and fewer victims are getting justice.’

Yet the Home Office still stick by the figures with a Home Office spokesman stating: ‘Many police forces are achieving significant reductions in crime with reduced budgets, and crime is at its lowest level since the survey began in 1981.’

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2268956/Arrests-fall--does-crime-solving-raising-doubts-government-claims-country-safe.html

John Flatley and Jenny Bradley at the Crime, Regional and Data Access Division of the ONS produced a paper analysing the methods of gathering crime statistics:-

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/guide-method/method-quality/specific/crime-statistics-methodology/methodological-note--analysis-of-variation-in-crime-trends.pdf

In this report the ONS also concedes that a growing number of crimes reported to the police are not being captured in crime recording systems. There are a range of possible drivers for this including:

• performance pressures associated with targets (e.g. to reduce crime or increase detection rates) acting as perverse incentives for some crimes to be downgraded from notifiable into non-notifiable categories or as ASB or as crime-related incidents (which are not captured in data returned to the Home Office);

• though forces have continued with their own internal audits, the cessation of independent audits from 2006/07 onwards may have reduced the focus on addressing non-compliance;

• the move to Neighbourhood Policing in recent years may also have led to more low level crimes being dealt with informally and outside the formal crime recording system; and,

• in the context of pressure on police budgets and a general policy shift to promote greater officer discretion, a return to a more evidential recording model.

So, in addition to the detailed reports we have amassed, containing evidence from front line officers, Home Office and force statistics down the years on this subject,
The Office for National Statistics concedes that accuracy of the numbers is potentially affected by perverse incentives to downgrade, mis-report or ignore crimes.
A high ranking Officer, Chief Superintendent Irene Curtis concedes that the service has fallen victim to the "Gaming Culture."
The Chairman of the Police Federation confirms that rank and file officers are ordered to manipulate the numbers.
Tom Winsor, the HMIC announces there will be a review to examine the probity of the numbers in all 43 forces.
Behind the scenes, a number of debates in the House of Commons and the House of Lords are accelerating pressure in the right direction.

It is unfortunate that Mr Winsor has, by his police pay review recommendations in Winsor I and II become unpopular with the rank and file. It is these very front line officers whose support he will require when investigating the corrupt and digraceful practices that have become the norm within the higher ranks of the service. We can only hope that he will apply a ruthless honest approach to the numbers and be prepared to expose the truth, whatever that may reveal. Only when the books have been completely opened and cleansed will the glimmer of faith and confidence appear. We hope Mr Winsor will see beyond the initial co-operative promises of Chief Officers, and dig as deep as is necessary to expose the deceitful pernicious practices.

This scandal will raise further concerns over the leadership and integrity of many of the past and present Chief Officers. We should expect that a considerable degree of document shredding and concealment and we hope Mr Winsor is prepared for the extent to which some will go to protect their positions. Mr Winsor will have to display a ruthless determination to uncover the truth if the public and rank and file officers are to be convinced of his independence and intentions to root out any improper practices. His speech to the Police Federation this week announced:-

"I also wanted to mention our work on crime data integrity, which I know has been a topic much debated during this Federation conference. Accurate figures are critical to the decisions that need to be made - information is the oxygen of intelligence. Because of what has been said here at the conference, because of media stories on this subject and the damaging effect on public confidence, because of concerns raised with HMIC by the public and the service, HMIC will conduct an all-force inspection of crime data integrity over the coming months".

Mr Winsor, whatever may have been said about your proposals for police pay and conditions, we wish you well in your endeavours in this critically important area.

Steve

Retired Police Officer
Thin Blue Line UK

POLICE FEDERATION CHIEF ADMITS CRIME STATISTICS ARE FIDDLED

2013-05-13T02:53:00.001-07:00

Steve Williams - Police Federation Chairman

Crime figures are being kept artificially low because of pressure from chief constables, a police leader will warn this week.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10052668/Police-ordered-to-slant-crime-data.html

Steve Williams, the head of the Police Federation will suggest a "fear factor" is preventing officers from blowing the whistle on how crime statistics are being manipulated.

The intervention by Steve Williams, chairman of the organisation which represents 130,000 frontline officers in England and Wales, is highly significant because it appears to confirm widespread public scepticism of how crime is recorded.

Official figures show crime is at an historic low, despite cuts to police budgets and staffing levels.

Mr Williams will say that police transparency on crime levels and other areas has been badly hit by the Leveson inquiry on Press standards, which examined alleged collusion between police officers and journalists.

Officers now fear that speaking out about scandals, mistakes and other serious issues - including pressure from senior officers to massage crime figures - will lead to disciplinary measures or the sack, he will suggest.

Ahead of his speech later this week at the Federation's annual conference in Bournemouth, Mr Williams said: "The latest crime figures showed a 5 per cent fall in crime but in reality, based on the anecdotes I'm getting, I am not sure that is the case.

"Pressure is being brought to bear on frontline officers on the way they are recording crime, and I am very concerned about the current situation. "Cops are very reluctant to speak to the media and say how it really is. It is all on the back of Leveson and some chief officers have imposed almost a gagging order on their staff. According to what we hear in the Federation it is happening en masse around the country".

"I do not think the true story is getting out because of the 'fear factor' of going public would have on police officers' careers."

"Officers feel that speaking to journalists will lead to them being labelled troublemakers and that it could lead to them losing their jobs, facing disciplinaries or affecting their promotion prospects. It means officers are not telling things how they really are and spin about things such as falling crime figures is not being challenged."

Mr Williams said there was considerable anecdotal evidence from police officers that the true level of crime is not being recorded.

"Closing police stations and reducing the number of cops means it is not so easy for victims to report crime to us," he said. "And most significantly bobbies find themselves under huge pressure about how to record crime. Crimes are downgraded in seriousness or the numbers are hidden. For example, if 10 caravans are broken into overnight with 10 different victims it will sometimes be recorded as just one crime. And a stolen mobile phone will be recorded as lost property, and so will not appear in crime data at all. If there is a crime where there is little or no evidence, and little chance of police detecting it, then that will be screened out at a very early stage so it does not appear in the stats."

He added: "With property crimes such as burglary and mugging, victims would historically report them because they needed a crime number for their insurance. People are now not too bothered about insuring their property and so it does not get reported."

"Officers need to know what they can and cannot get involved in, and when there is a public interest in them coming out about what they are asked to do," said Mr Williams.

In latest figures published last month the total number of crimes recorded by the police fell 8 per cent to 3.7 million last year. And the estimated level of crime in England and Wales fell by 5 per cent to 8.9 million offences against adults, according to the Crime Survey for England and Wales, which asks the public about their experiences of crime regardless of whether they reported incidents to the police. Separate figures showed the number of suspects arrested by police fell more than twice as fast as the decline in crime rates.

The Opposition said the 9 per cent fall in arrests raised concerns that criminals were “getting away with it”.

The Office for National Statistics has suggested that pressure to meet targets may be leading officers to downgrade crimes.

THIN BLUE LINE COMMENT

Regular visitors to these pages know that we have not only been protesting about the scandal of how police have been cooking the books of crime for many years, but we have also provided detailed reports of precisely how this is being done. Well done Mr Williams for raising your head above the parapet on this issue. We would go further though to say there is more than anecdotal evidence, there is officer evidence and detailed hard evidence to prove how the statistics are regulalrly fudged and manipulated. Chief Officers must be held to account for this. Whether they have constructed the systems that fiddle the numbers, condoned the actions or merely turned a blind eye to the practices, it is ONLY THEY who have benefitted from this distortion and manipulation. It is ONLY THEY who received exhorbitant bonus payments down the years (payments that make the MP Expenses Scandal appear small stuff by comparison), to reflect crime reductions and detection increases. It is ONLY THEY who have advanced their careers and political ambitions on the back of this disgraceful deception. It is the general public who are being conned, the rank and file who have lost faith in their superiors.

Most recently, in the same week the recent crime statistics were released, Chief Superintendent Irene Curtis, President of the Superintendents Association, showed integrity and courage lacking in her colleagues when she admitted that the service was ridden with the Gaming or Statistical fiddling culture. See the links below that refer.

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/scrap-targets-restore-common-sense.html

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/crime-down-again-or-emperors-new-clothes.html

Confidence in the police has fallen to an all time low, along with officer morale. It is the senior officers who must shoulder the responsibility for this, stand up and be counted, restore honesty and probity to the numbers. Start again if you must, but this CANNOT be allowed to continue.

Question for Theresa May "When will you display the same concern and awareness that this subject needs a root and branch exposure of what is going on? When will you restore probity to the numbers so rank and file officers no longer fear the damage to their integrity as officers?"

STOP using crime statistics as your political football.

ADMIT the statistics are fiddled mercilessly and in their present form are worthless, other than to help ACPO Officers ascend the greasy pole.

START again with a clean sheet if necessary. Only this will enable officers to focus on protecting life and property, preventing and detecting crime, which is what the tax payers are entitled to expect and what the majority of committed loyal officers joined up for.

Steve

Retired West Midlands Police Officer
Thin Blue Line

SCANDAL OF CHIEF OFFICER SALARIES - ALL IN THIS TOGETHER?

2013-05-07T01:59:00.000-07:00

New CC of Essex - Stephen Kavanagh

The Essex Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) has decided to pay the new chief constable the top amount, saying he was “the very best” of an outstanding field of candidates.

http://www.policeoracle.com/news/Top-pay-justified-for-'exceptional'-new-chief_64692.html

Met Deputy Assistant Commissioner – and from May 7 – Chief Constable Stephen Kavanagh (pictured) will receive a total of £192,163. PCC Nick Alston has the power to pay a chief 10 per cent below or above the spot of rate of £148,194 for the role but only when an appointment is made.

As far back as September 2010 we were writing about the scandal of Chief Officer pay. It seems if anything, the situation has not improved.

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2010/09/top-10-highest-paid-cops-are-they.html

Chief Officers feature frequently in the highest paid Rich List the public sector. Panorama did a piece on it around Sept 2010 and we were asked to contribute (via the Bureau of Investigative Journalism). What should be born in mind though, is that the program was completed before the 2.5% pay rise that the Chiefs enjoyed from September 1st in t hat year. So even the astronomic figures quoted are understated.

In our article, we reported the TOP 10 HIGHEST PAID police personnel above and would ask the question "Are they really worth this much?" Furthermore, is it right that these highly paid, self serving ACPO ranked officers should have a total say in the pay and conditions of the rank and file?

In a report we published subsequently, we revealed that even based on basic salary:-

14 Chief Officers are paid a basic of £150,000+
6 Chief Officers are paid between £140 to £150,000 per annum
26 Chief Officers (inc Met Deputies) are paid between £130 and £140,000 per annum.

On that basis, it is even conceivable that Mr Kavanagh may have taken a drop in salary to move!

When the Government started applying the fiscal scalpel to policing, they should have started at the top.

THERE ARE TOO MANY CHIEFS. MANY OF THEM ARE PAID TOO MUCH.

THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH INDIANS AT THE FRONTLINE OF POLICING.

THESE ARE FUNDAMENTAL BASICS. THE GOVERNMENT MUST REVERSE THIS PROFLIGATE TREND IF THERE IS TO BE ANY HOPE OF RESTORING FAITH IN THE SERVICE, MORALE IN THE TROOPS AND CONFIDENCE IN THE LEADERSHIP OF THE SERVICE.

A few comments from the Oracle piece sum it up...

Maverick22 - Sun, 05 May 2013
Once again we are all ''in it together'', no wonder PCC's are been as devisive . Why is he any better and more deserving than the previous Chief. If Kavanagh had any integrity he would turn it down and tell the PCC we are supposed to be setting an example, not being greedy.

cadiar - Sun, 05 May 2013
Now of course the PCC will remunerate all his Police Constables in a similar fashion... thought not! He certainly knows how to win friends amongst those he is going to rely on to get his figures right.

Guest - 9 hours ago
Talk about double standards, this is treble standards and Gov hypocrisy at its highest level.

'I find it hard to imagine a more important job than keeping us all safe'?

How exactly does 'he' do that? NOTHING he will ever do, say or decide will EVER have the same 'keeping the public safe' as regular response officers that put their own safety in jeopardy every single shift the do. They are the 'real' deservees of decent remuneration and the victims of this atrocity. Where on earth was the necessity to pay him this much at this precise moment? Did he say he was only going to come over for the big bucks or was this more likely a 'you stroke my back and ill stroke yours' pre arranged ready done deal prior to even applying? Yes i think the latter is the most likely.. Well done PCC yet another prime example of an overt corruption or at the very least a grotesque inneficient waist of valuable resources. Nobody will ever believe he's worth that much more than the others who would not have pre-demanded such a high salary, but perhaps they wouldn't be the PCC's yes man either..watch this space..puppet.

A NOTE TO THE COALITION MINISTERS SO KEEN ON IMPLEMENTING THE PCC STRATEGY

Can someone please explain how paying Chiefs this much is an indicator that PCC's will provide more efficient management of the police purse? With fewer officers on the front line we have absolutely no doubt that Essex will be yet another force to show continued declining crime and improved detections. The PCC and new Chief will have to show the money was well spent, by fair means or foul.

Crime Down Again Or The Emperors New Clothes?

2013-04-28T04:26:00.000-07:00

So, yet again, we are expected to swallow the tripe that crime in the UK has fallen.

Sooner or later, the lid will be prized off this statistical can of worms and the public will learn, once and for all that the senior officers of UK policing have been fiddling the figures mercilessly for years.

The BBC & The Guardian among others continue to ride this fallacious bandwagon being peddled by the Chief Officers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22294097

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jul/14/crime-statistics-england-wales

Ironic then, that in the same week that these astounding new revelations about falling crime (an alleged drop in recorded crime of a further 8%), that ONE senior police officer has raised her head above the parapet and admitted that it’s all one big sham.

http://www.policeoracle.com/news/Policing-is-not-a-competition_64046.html

In an article in Police Oracle Chief Superintendent Irene Curtis, Charr of the Superintendents Association, showing courage and integrity lacking in her ACPO colleagues, admitted that league tables and performance targets had created a culture of “Gaming” – cooking the books or just plain fiddling to you and me.

This is precisely what we have been saying from these pages for a number of years. We haven’t just said so, we have produced the evidence of the extent of the fiddling and the modus operandi being used to orchestrate the fiddling. See previous articles from these pages and the detailed reports in the section to the right of this article.

To quote Chief Superintendent Curtis

“For many years forces have been compared with others at a national level and this has resulted in league tables being promulgated throughout the service down to individual level.

I know this because I was part of it. As both an Operations Superintendent and a BCU Commander I spent much of my time focused on the reds and greens. I recall conversations with colleagues about them holding back detections for the current month as they had reached their target and therefore could keep some in the bank for next month. Discussions about whether we should be encouraging staff to charge offenders with public order offences or drunk and disorderly, depending on whether our focus was on detection rates or crime reduction. I’ve also sat through many performance meetings trying to explain why my BCU’s crime figures had gone up or down by X per cent and what I was going to do about it.

I look back now with some sadness that I was part of a culture that appeared to treat numbers as being more important than doing the right thing and yet for a long time I didn’t do anything to challenge it.

I've spoken to a number of colleagues about this recently, including some chief officers, and I often hear responses such as, 'that doesn't happen in my force' or, 'targets are necessary otherwise staff won’t do what's required.'

Well that doesn’t fit with what I’m hearing. I'm picking up a growing sense of frustration from colleagues in the federated ranks who feel under immense pressure to deliver targets and feel that gaming is often the only way they can deliver this. There’s no doubt about it, the use of numerical targets in performance management is embedded in the police psyche”.

Better late than never Ma’am.

Restorative Justice

Chief Superintendent Curtis goes on to talk about the restorative justice processes , cautions, PND’s TIC’s and the other “out-of-court” disposals now available to police officers.

Chief Superintendent Curtis : “What I'm proposing is a return to common sense policing which focuses on doing the right thing for victims and the public. This would include freeing up the performance management framework from targets that don't just lead to dysfunctional behaviour, but also an often disproportionate bureaucracy of audit and compliance work.

I strongly believe that such an approach is essential to reduce demand and thus create further capacity for the diminishing resources that will be available for policing as a consequence of this and the next Comprehensive Spending Review. We need to minimise the impact of these cuts on our ability to reduce crime and protect the public”.

Common sense policing. Now where have we heard that before? Let’s hope someone is listening to her wise and ethical advices.

Again from these pages, we have reported how the restorative justice processes are abused beyond recognition. We have recently submitted articles, again providing evidence of the Gaming Culture, directly to Chris Grayling, who has commissioned a review of the cautions and restorative justice system.

Working with retired DCI Dr Rodger Patrick, now well known for his excellent detailed contributions, recently heard at the Home Affairs Committee and House of Lords debates on the subject, we have frequently espoused how mercilessly forces, led by Chief Officers who either created, overlooked or condoned these systems.

The latest media reports confirm that the message has yet to hit home.

With many thousands of officers wiped off the headcount as a result of the cuts and yet they STILL expect us to believe a further 8% drop? It doesn’t take rocket science to see that the numbers are being fiddled even more to suggest that forces indeed can achieve more with less.

Crime Down or Emperors New Clothes?

What is most worrying, is that these numbers we are expected to swallow, harm both the rank and file officers and the general public.

Chief Officers can con the politicians and their respective Police & Crime Commissioners that crime continues to fall no matter how few officers are available to deal with it. ACPO and the Chief Officers have shown themselves to be totally self-serving and shamelessly uncaring about the front line consequences of their strategies. But why should they care? They get paid handsomely for showing how wonderfully effective they are, what incentive is there for them to play the honesty card?

Cuts to the police service were authorised largely as a result of the many years of declining recorded crime. The statistics are crooked and distorted beyond belief. Many thousands of officers less to protect life and property, to prevent and detect crime. Yet the Chief Officers that are responsible for fudging the statistics remain in post, happily drawing their salary without conscience that they are the authors of the misfortunes dumped on the rank and file.

Whilst this is allowed to continue, the tax payer is being cheated out of the service he and she deserves and the front line officers are expected to toe the line, play the game and submit to behaviour that compromises their professional integrity.

A few responses to Ch Supt Curtis' article:

So very true, I hope those in command will listen to this Chief Superintendent who is in touch with reality...let's us get back to policing, not targets, tackling crime not counting numbers!

Common sense at last, but will it ever be used or implemented by our command teams? I fear not!!!!

What a sensible officer, so refreshing

Unfortunately she is but one voice in a sea of many, it's ACPO that needs convincing.
Yes I am a dinosaur and can remember when officers had discretion and not get ticks in the box to make your CC look good, it was also down to common sense, once the bean counters took over common sense went out the window.

This has been a problem for years. Performance can be improved without top down targets. Governments of all hues and senior managers need to understand this: http://jonharveyassociates.blogspot.co.uk/2009/07/bonfire-of-targets.html

I find it amusing when the author states " I'm picking up a growing sense of frustration from colleagues in the federated ranks who feel under immense pressure to deliver targets and feel that gaming is often the only way they can deliver this."
Where have you been for the last 10 years. Federated ranks have been generally unhappy with the culture for nearly a decade and we were ignored and treated like peasants for objecting!

I agree but wasn't it ACPO who cosied up to the last government and got all sorts of goodies from them to play the numbers game and make the government look good. They did exactly the same with the health service. you go to any A & E you'll get seen by a triage nurse in quick time then given a ticket and probably three hours you will be seen by someone who will deal with your injury, but on the records it will show that you were seen within 5 minutes. I really don't care how many rings it takes for the phone to be answered, I care that when it's answered the person on the other end knows how best to deal with my problem and I care that when the cop gets there they know what to do. ACPO have a lot to answer for.

The obsession with targets is a manifestation of a deeper misunderstanding of the police role – that of a crime-fighter – and that is why the articulate,intelligent and sincere leaders persist with them.Police as keepers of peace,maintainers of order,and dispensers of justice is the role that need to be emphasized to get rid of the targets of crime and detection figures.

It's all true what she says, but I bet targets still remain!

Always worth a visit is Dave's site over at Bankside Babble... Particularly relevant article this week looking at the same subject from a different angle.

https://bankbabble.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/crime-statistics-fact-or-fiction/

GREAT LEADERS OF MEN : THE LORD DEAR Kt QPM DL

2013-03-29T12:18:00.003-07:00

Lord Dear & Steve at the House of Lords

With immense pride, I met with The Lord Geoffrey Dear Kt QPM DL at the House of Lords this week.

Lord Dear was Chief Constable of the West Midlands Police from 1985 to 1990 when he became one of her Majesties Inspectors of Constabulary. He was described by the broadcaster Sir Robin Day as "the best known and most respected police officer of his generation". Having served in the West Midlands whilst Lord Dear was in charge, I would totally endorse that comment.

Readers will know that we posted our support of Lord Dear recently. when he wrote an article in the Times that outlined the need for Leadership in policing. As a result of that article and contact with Lord Dear, he kindly extended the invite to the Lords. The article link is below if you missed it.

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/police-leadership-time-for-new-moral.html

23 years after his retirement from the West Midlands force, it was a privilege to meet the “Boss” again. Now 75, Lord Dear is even more pragmatic and eloquent than I remembered.

Lord Dear acted as our guide, with fascinating insights into the history and activities of the Lords, against the splendour and majesty of the building. For anyone who has not had the privilege of a tour you may wish to click the links below to see a short video and an online tour of the Lords.

http://www.parliament.uk/about/podcasts/video-tours/lords-chamber/

http://www.parliament.uk/visiting/online-tours/virtualtours/lords-tour/

This tour is also available on Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wVllfyvGfU&nofeather=True

The most enjoyable moments however were the conversations over coffee. Lord Dear is an engaging and compelling speaker, both publicly and one to one. 34 years as a police officer, many in the most senior capacity has endowed him with vast experience of policing, justice, the law, politics and business. It was most pleasing to hear his common sense views and values on important subjects such as free speech, international business affairs, the malaise that presently exists in UK policing resulting from the lack of real leadership right through to the thorny subject of gay marriage. In a letter to more than 400 peers, Lord Dear criticised the way David Cameron “shunted” the bill through “a very one-sided” Commons committee stage after “wholly inadequate” scrutiny in the Commons.

He said his initial soundings suggested there was a real possibility that the bill could now “go down” in the Lords despite support in the Commons.

“The thing that really bothers many is that the normal process for something as potentially divisive as this has not been followed.”

“The feeling in the Lords is that although (in the Commons) the whip was officially declared not to be on there was a lot of arm twisting going on.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9953402/Independent-peer-warns-of-growing-Lords-rebellion-over-gay-marriage.html

Another of Lord Dears passions is that of free speech. Perhaps the best example of this is his tabling of the proposal to remove the word “insulting” from section 5(1)a of the 1986 Public Order Bill.
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/lords/?gid=2012-12-12a.1119.1

To see Lord Dear introducing the amendment go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQJBKvN42PM

Lord Dears passionate and compelling drive for the changes to Section 5, attracted the support of no less than Rowan Atkinson. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gciegyiLYtY

As Rowan commented, it is strange that this act, unless amended with continue to represent life imitating fictional humour characters, as in the Not The 9 O'Clock News sketch about a manifestly racist Constable Savage...

The problematic section of the act reads:-

A person is guilty of an offence if he—

(a)uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or disorderly behaviour, or
(b)displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting,
within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby.
(2)An offence under this section may be committed in a public or a private place, except that no offence is committed where the words or behaviour are used, or the writing, sign or other visible representation is displayed, by a person inside a dwelling and the other person is also inside that or another dwelling.
(3)It is a defence for the accused to prove—
(a)that he had no reason to believe that there was any person within hearing or sight who was likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress, or
(b)that he was inside a dwelling and had no reason to believe that the words or behaviour used, or the writing, sign or other visible representation displayed, would be heard or seen by a person outside that or any other dwelling, or
(c)that his conduct was reasonable.
(4)A constable may arrest a person without warrant if—
(a)he engages in offensive conduct which a constable warns him to stop, and
(b)he engages in further offensive conduct immediately or shortly after the warning.
(5)In subsection (4) “offensive conduct” means conduct the constable reasonably suspects to constitute an offence under this section, and the conduct mentioned in paragraph (a) and the further conduct need not be of the same nature.
(6)A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale.

With his customary eloquence Lord Dear opened the debate with:-

“My Lords, in introducing Amendment 119 I have in the front of my mind the words attributed to Voltaire as far back as 1759:

"I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".

That is what it is all about tonight. The amendment seeks to curb what I believe is an increasing misuse of the criminal law so as to curb or prevent the proper exercise of free speech. The amendment intends that the word "insulting" should be taken out of Section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986 and that Section 6 of that Act should be similarly amended to take account of the earlier change”.

On the Thin Blue Line, this is a subject particularly close to our hearts for the following reasons:-

We feel the demise of responsible whistle blowing police blogs is largely due to extreme pressure forced upon their authors, effectively restricting free speech. This is often as a result of accusations that authors have brought their force or individuals into disrepute. The withdrawal of the hugely popular Inspector Gadget blog is the most recent example.

We have reported frequently on these pages that Section 5 has been widely abused as a result of Chief Officers identifying it as an easy win offence where detections are more likely. However, the matters under investigation are all too often minor domestic issues that should really not form part of police activity unless to protect life and property which is rarely the case. The common example is that of estranged couples, allegedly insulting each other to the point where one or both can allege being in fear, when in fact this is more often than not a ploy used by either or both to call in the support of the authorities to exert control over their former partner. Chief Officers have all too often been guilty of “Gaming” in the form of “Skewing” which is redeploying resources to the easy wins to the detriment of more difficult to resolve crimes that the public have a genuine fear of.

Section 5 appears in its 000’s in the recorded crime registers, distorting the real picture of crime and criminalising otherwise innocent members of the public who will falsely admit alleged offences for fear of the trauma and uncertainty of prosecution.

Geoffrey James Dear, Baron Dear, QPM, DL is a retired British police officer. His career makes interesting reading.

1956: Joined Peterborough Combined Police (which became part of Mid-Anglia Constabulary in 1965) as a Cadet then as a Constable
1965: Went to University College, London on a Bramshill Scholarship to study law. Graduating in 1968
1968: Served as divisional commander in Cambridge
1972: Appointed Assistant Chief Constable (Operations) of Nottinghamshire Combined Constabulary
1975 to 1977: Seconded to Bramshill Police College as Director of Command Training.
1979: Awarded the Queen's Commendation for Brave Conduct for his arrest of an armed and mentally deranged man who held his infant son hostage and barricaded himself in a house after a shooting incident.

THE LONDON GAZETTE, 11TH SEPTEMBER 1979

Queen's Commendation for Brave Conduct

Geoffrey James DEAR, Assistant Chief Constable, Nottinghamshire Constabulary. For services leading to the arrest of an armed and mentally deranged man who held his infant son hostage in a barricaded house following a shooting incident.

1980: Transferred to the Metropolitan Police as Deputy Assistant Commissioner (Training). In this role he came to public attention as he instituted racial awareness training for police officers in the wake of the Brixton riots, into which he also conducted an internal investigation.

1981: Appointed Assistant Commissioner "D" (Personnel and Training

1982: He was awarded the Queen's Police Medal (QPM)

1983: Headed the Met's investigation into the shooting of Steven Waldorf.

1984: Became Assistant Commissioner "A" (Operations and Administration) of the Metropolitan Police. He was the last officer to hold the post of Assistant Commissioner "A" before it was abolished in the reorganisation later that year.

1985: Became Chief Constable of West Midlands Police. In the West Midlands, he quickly came to the fore with his handling of the aftermath of the shooting by police of a young boy and, separately, the aftermath of the 1985 Handsworth riots. He instituted wide-ranging changes in that force, both administratively and operationally.

1989: He headed the investigation into the Hillsborough Stadium Disaster, the findings of which were roundly endorsed by the 2012 Independent Enquiry into the same occurrence.

1990: He was appointed one of HM Inspectors of Constabulary.

1997: He was knighted in

the 1997 New Year Honours,

shortly before his retirement.

1997 to 1998: He was a member of the Glidewell review into the Crown Prosecution Service from and advised the Auld Review of the Criminal Courts process in 2002 and the Virdi Enquiry in 2003.
2 May 2006: Dear was created a life peer as Baron Dear, of Willersey in the County of Gloucestershire.
He has held a number of remunerated positions as non-executive director or chairman, and is currently non-executive chairman of Blue Star Capital plc.
He takes an active and regular part in the business of the House of Lords, speaking from the cross benches on home affairs, criminal justice, and rural affairs. In 2008 he successfully lead opposition in the House of Lords to defeat the Government's intention to extend from 28 to 42 days the length of time that suspected terrorists could be held without charge.
He is Deputy Lieutenant of Worcestershire, was Vice-Lord Lieutenant of that county from 1998 to 2001, and is an Honorary Bencher of Gray's Inn. He is a Fellow of University College, London and an Honorary Fellow of Birmingham City University

Lord Dear

Please accept our warm and sincere thanks for the superb welcome and kind hospitality shown to us during our visit.

The subjects covered resonated strongly with us all and we will continue to take a great interest in the work and debates where you are involved. It is a great comfort to meet someone in a position of influence who is so in touch with the general feelings and views of so many in the community.

With warmest regards and best wishes

Steve Bennett

Retired Police Officer

West Midlands Police

Creator and Author of the Thin Blue Line UK

Post script...

After the photo's were taken and Lord Dear returned to his duties inside the building, we had a thoroughly enjoyable 20 minutes chatting with the DPG guys on duty at the Peers entrance. A pleasant surprise, in these dark days of policing, to meet a group of guys and girls with a sense of humour and obvious passion for the job. Thank heavens the majority of coppers do not reflect the disgraceful behavious or some of their Chiefs and seniors of recent months. Great to meet you guys, and a massive thank you, to you and all the other rank and file front line coppers for all that you continue to do for us.

SCRAP TARGETS - RESTORE COMMON SENSE POLICING

2013-03-18T05:13:00.000-07:00

Superintendents' Association president warns that new approach to law enforcement is needed.

http://www.policeoracle.com/news/Supers-President:-Tick-Box-Targets-'Threaten-Policing'_62268.html

What refreshing news, to hear that the new President of the Superintendents Association conced that the police service has been engulfed and threatened by a target culture.

The new president of the Superintendents’ Association of England and Wales has warned that a “tick box” target culture is prevailing in the Police Service – despite the best efforts of the Home Secretary to return discretion to front line officers.

Ch Supt Irene Curtis, who takes over the helm from predecessor Ch Supt Derek Barnett today, March 18, maintained that officers are still battling for arrests and detections – and that “a different approach” is now required.

The experienced senior operational officer told reporters: “The use of numerical targets in performance management is embedded in the police psyche.

“Policing should not be a competition. It should be collaborative and in the best interests of the public we serve. A different approach is needed to how we police.”

Ch Supt Curtis said the service needed to move away from the “tick box” focus on performance culture. Although Home Secretary Theresa May had officially removed central government policing targets – claiming the only goal for officers is “to reduce crime” – the president said targets remain a huge issue in policing “at multiple levels within the majority of police forces”.

She added: “Despite assurances from the government about the removal of central targets there is still a strong performance management culture in the service.

“This has created a generation of people who are great at chasing targets but do not always recognise that doing the right thing is the best thing for the public.”

Ch Supt Curtis, who is the first woman to take up the full-time presidency of the association, warned that targets had the “unintended consequences of forces, teams and even individual police officers concentrating efforts on ticking boxes and outdoing their peers at the expense of simply being the best they can be”.

The officer told reporters “I'm proposing a return to common sense policing which focuses on doing the right thing for victims and the public.

“This would include freeing up the performance management framework from targets that lead to increased audit and compliance work and dysfunctional behaviour.

“There is an urgent need to develop a more trusting performance management culture in the service. It is important that forces have measures to help them to understand how they are performing, but they should not be dominated by targets.”

Ch Supt Curtis, who has nearly three decades of policing experience under her belt, said she believed “front line officers are currently stretched beyond where they should be”.

She added: “What is required is the evidence-based deployment of resources rather than arbitrary numerical targets.

“I strongly believe that such an approach is essential to reduce demand and thus create further capacity for the diminishing resources available for policing as a consequence of this and the next Comprehensive Spending Review."

Ma'am, we genuinely wish you the very best of luck with your objectives and convincing your colleagues that this is the only way forward. Unless and until the target culture blight is wiped out from the service, confidence cannot begin to return, either from the public or the rank and file officers still plagued with bureaucracy. Targets have driven operational policing for too long with disasterous consequences. The statistics are no longer trusted and the public have become weary and angry with a service that have become box ticking, form filling adminstrators that seems to have lost its way of genuinely serving and protecting the public.

INSPECTOR GADGET : OFFICER DOWN

2013-03-15T08:08:00.000-07:00

Wherever you are Guv, take care & best wishes

In a sad indictment of modern policing, one of the best-known anonymous police bloggers has quit writing after seven years of sharing an officer's eye view of the world of policing.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/mar/13/police-blogger-quits-pressure-unofficial

This country's police were once the envy of the world; now they struggle to retain the confidence of their own people and have long since lost the support and confidence of the British public. Weighed down by political correctness, burdensome targets, excessive paperwork, non-core police activity and incessant government tinkering, fewer officers than ever are seen on the streets. Everyone knows that policing needs a root and branch overhaul – not the structural reform so beloved of the Labour government, but a cultural rejuvenation that restores to trained professionals the freedom to take their own decisions.

These were the subjects that Gadget focused on. The job he and we loved so much has been eroded so dramatically, it no longer bears any resemblance of the police service that was once so deserving of the world’s respect. Gadget implored the outside world to recognise what was happening to the service in the hope that someone, somewhere, somehow would listen and take steps to returning the service to a world of common sense and justice. He wrote about the malaise affecting the British Justice system, the ridiculous and strangling bureaucracy that pervades in the job to this day, the mindless target driven culture among Chief and senior officers that obstructs frontline and response officers from doing their job moist effectively, the endless fudging of crime statistics and the political interference in the everyday operational duties.

Those close to the Gadget say he has grown frustrated at the cuts to the police service and feels he is unable to enact any change through his writing. It is not known whether he has been directly warned off by senior officers in his force but he quits at a time when those officers who are tweeting under pseudonyms say they are being intimidated off social media by their bosses.

OTHER WHISTLEBLOWERS

Inspector Gadget is by no means the first to quit the medium voluntarily or otherwise.

One of the first and most visited police blogs was authored by a Lancashire Detective, Richard Horton, who in 2008 started blogging under the pseudonym "Nightjack". Recognition for his writings came in the form of the Orwell Prize in February 2009. Richard is the first to admit that some of his posts had taken on a harshly political edge. Winning the award threw him into the spotlight and he lost his cloak of anonymity when the Times newspaper traced him and sent photographers around to his house. The result was that he felt pressured by his force to close the blog and cease his writings.

Pc Stuart Davidson served as an officer in Staffordshire police and his "Coppersblog" site was among the first to expose the problems that had beset UK policing. Blogging as PC David Copperfield, his true identity was discovered by his force and as a result, he felt compelled (or was pushed) to close down the blog and is now a serving police officer in Canada.

WHO WILL BLOW THE WHISTLE NOW?

A whistle blower is a person who raises a concern about wrongdoing occurring in an organization or body of people. Usually this person would be from that same organization. The revealed misconduct may be classified in many ways; for example, a violation of a law , rule, regulation and/or a direct threat to public interest , such as fraud , health/safety violations, and corruption . Whistle blowers may make their allegations internally (for example, to other people within the accused organization) or externally (to regulators, law enforcement agencies, to the media or to groups concerned with the issues).

Whistle blowers frequently face reprisal , sometimes at the hands of the organization or group which they have accused, sometimes from related organizations, and sometimes under law.

Origins of term

The term whistle blower derives from the practice of English police officers, who would blow their whistles when they noticed the commission of a crime. The whistle would alert other law enforcement officers and the general public of danger.

PUBLIC INTEREST DISCLOSURE ACT 1998

In 2002, a Government amendment gave police officers the same protection for whistleblowing as the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 (PIDA) provided other workers, including their civilian colleagues.

The need that police officers should not be discouraged from blowing the whistle on wrongdoing was strongly supported in 1998 during the passage of Richard Shepherd MP’s Public Interest Disclosure Bill. The Government gave assurances then and since that police officers would receive PIDA equivalent protection.

However, even such good intent has clearly not resulted in Police Officers having the freedom to speak of matters that clearly require reform.

As is clear from research from HMI on whistleblowing policies:

“There is a strong feeling amongst officers and support staff that retribution, subtle or direct, would result from making complaints against colleagues. There is a perception no one commends such officers for demonstrating moral courage". “The Inspection found grievance procedures were widely held to be ineffective, with a misunderstanding of what they might achieve…in most forces, for a variety of reasons, there was little or no confidence in the system. …One force recently carried out an equality audit and, with a response rate of 53%, it revealed that 75% of police officers…believed it was either true or partly true that making a complaint or formal grievance would be held against them.”

The provision in regulations and guidance that supervisors and managers should ensure that police whistle blowers are not victimised is also insufficient as HMI discovered:

“A concern emerged strongly during the Inspection that officers who are more senior will not support junior colleagues who challenge on an integrity issue. Once a manger who has tried to challenge and rectify bad behaviour, has been undermined by those in more senior positions, perhaps because of weakness or nepotism, they are understandably less likely to make a second challenge.”

CONCLUDING COMMENT

"I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." François-Marie Arouet a.k.a.Voltaire

Whilst we have not always agreed with everything Inspector Gadget has written, he makes some very relevant, important points. If he has been shut down because of paranoia in the upper echelons of policing, this must be seen as a backward step in the honest reforms so badly needed for UK policing.

"All that's necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for enough good men to do nothing." Edmund Burke (British Statesman and Philosopher 1729-1797)"

To Quote From Gadget :- My message to the government is this; ignore all the vested interests and the claptrap. Give us some old school traditional police front line leadership and we will deliver where others have failed. Although you might not be able to count it in the same way.

Inspector Gadget, whose blog recorded more than 12m hits, unexpectedly tweeted on Monday that he was "going state 11" – off duty – and has since deleted postings dating back to 2006, many of which attacked the sometimes farcical bureaucracy he believes is strangling the police service. The last posting on Gadget's blog before all posts were deleted read: "This jobs is f...d".

If the leadership of the police cannot bring itself to accept, openly and honestly, that reforms are needed at all levels within the service, then once again, we the British public will be hoodwinked and conned into believing that all in the police garden is rosy, which it clearly is not. Who will take up the mantle and restore the public and officer confidence so badly needed now?

Never has true Leadership been required in the service more than right now. Lord Dear (former Chief Constable of the West Midlands and perhaps one of the last real Leaders in the service) said it so well in his recent Times article.

What the job desperately needs now is Leaders NOT managers. The service doesn't seem to know the difference. Sadly, Leadership is not the only element lacking at the top. Public confidence and that of the troops will never fully return until there is distinct evidence that the Chief Officer standards and qualities are beyond reproach. Over as many months, 18 Chiefs and SMT ranks either disciplined, arrested, or dismissed for unprofessional and even criminal conduct is an indictment of how so many clearly feel they are above the law they are meant to uphold.

How do you instil moral compass values in a hierarchy that doesn't seem to know the difference between crooked and straight?

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/police-leadership-time-for-new-moral.html

The bonuses paid to Chief Officers in return for allegedly reducing crime, when in fact many were scurrilously and deceitfully cooking the books, would eclipse the outrage caused by the MP's scandal if it were fully exposed.

For twenty plus years, too many so called good men did just that. Fallacious decreases in crime, 000's no crimed, 000's more screened out, 000's more again left as incidents to keep them off the books have decimated the true picture of crime and distorted the reality beyond belief. Yet still, they bleat about how crime has reduced!!

The single biggest negative consequence of this crime of the century, is the slashing of frontline troop numbers all as a consequence of Chief Officers fudging the numbers for personal gain. Look what it led to, politicians who choose to use the numbers as a political football to slash resources. The only people to blame are the Chief Officers who orchestrated, condoned, overlooked or failed to act. Authors of misfortune that is now the burden of the rest of the service.

Before any leadership skills can even be considered, there needs to be a root and branch cull of those corrupt officers whose continued presence poisons the service.

To Inspector Gadget. Thank you for your courage. Thank you for your honesty. Thank you for trying to highlight all that ails the service. Let us hope that all of your efforts were not in vain.

JOKE JUSTICE! 8,000 criminals given community service ELEVEN times before being jailed

2013-02-22T23:45:00.001-08:00

Nearly eight thousand criminals jailed last year had already received 11 or more community sentences, a think-tank reveals today.

It says the statistic highlighted the ‘revolving door system’ of non-custodial punishments that exposes the public to hardened offenders who commit one crime after another.

The Centre for Crime Prevention reveals in a report that of the 107,688 criminals jailed in the financial year 2011/12, three-quarters had already been given at least one community sentence.

Three quarters of criminals who were jailed in 2011/12 had served a community sentence before
Some 64 per cent – 68,485 offenders – had received at least two, while 35 per cent, or nearly 37,516, had received five or more.

A staggering 7,783 had 11 or more community punishments on their record, while 1,784 had 16 or more. There were 407 who had received an astonishing 21 or more of these sentences.

Justice Secretary Chris Grayling has promised to put 'punishment' at the centre of tough new community sentences.

‘These figures prove that letting thousands of criminals off with one community sentence after another is failing. Stiff prison sentences protect the public and have lower reoffending rates.’
He continued: ‘Apologists for community sentencing regularly cite reoffending by those released from prison as proof of its failure. ‘The vast majority of prisoners had also been through community punishments – often multiple times – before they made it as far as prison. The main difference is that prisoners are no danger to the public for the duration of their sentence.’

Justice Secretary Chris Grayling has pledged to put ‘punishment’ at the centre of tough new community sentences.

He has given assurances that all community sentences will carry some punitive element, such as unpaid work, to ensure they are no longer a ‘soft option’.

Thousands of criminals are expected to be put on GPS satellite tags so their every movement can be monitored. Mr Grayling also wants to use charities and businesses to tackle entrenched reoffending as part of a ‘rehabilitation revolution’. Work will be outsourced with firms ‘paid by results’, with fixed targets on re-offending rates.

Justice Minister Jeremy Wright said: ‘Prison does work. But we are toughening up community sentences so every sentence contains a genuine punishment, including fines, unpaid work and strict curfews and exclusion zones – which can be enforced with state-of-the-art GPS tracking.’

Last year 22,817 community punishments were scrapped in 2011 because the subject was failing to follow conditions set down by the court, such as completing unpaid work, meeting their probation officer or attending drug treatment.

POLICE LEADERSHIP: TIME FOR A NEW MORAL COMPASS?

2013-02-09T09:16:00.001-08:00

Hardly surprising that ACPO President Sir Hugh Orde (pictured left above) would vociferously defend the integrity of the upper echelons of the police service against criticisms levelled by Lord Geoffrey Dear QPM, (Pictured right), retired Chief Constable of the West Midlands who wrote a compelling and eloquent article about the need for improved police leadership in the Times on February 1st 2013

Clearly Sir Hugh has his future career to consider & it is only to be expected that should he accept any degree of corruption exists it would imply guilt by association or condoning such activity.

Lord Dear, whilst of the old school was no fool. Yes, there was controversy on his watch, but unlike so many other Senior Officers who were part of the problem, Mr Dear firmly positioned himself as part of the solution and stood visibly and strongly against corrupt and improper practices.

Sir Hugh will protest that he is a policeman first and foremost. Events and history suggest that he is more of a political animal than he cares to admit. As such he is well versed in the art of deflection. His response letter to the Times demonstrated just that.

So, let's look at what both men had to say, then we'll examine the evidence.

Starting with Lord Dear in the Times on 1st February...

Not so long ago misconduct by a senior police officer was rare and newsworthy. Not Now.

Too many top-rank officers are in trouble in the courts and serious doubts are being cast about the trustworthiness of the service at all levels – the death of Ian Tomlinson at the G20 disturbances, Plebgate, phone-hacking, Hillsborough, the apparent politicisation of the Police Federation and so on. Certainly the police can point to falling crime rates and great success in preventing further terrorist attacks since 7/7, but their response too often appears to be disconnected from what the public expect.

The basic problem is leadership. The service has created, trained and promoted to its top ranks managers, rather than leaders. The roots of this go deep, certainly to a decision taken at the Police Staff College in the early 1990s to drop the focus on leadership on the grounds that it was “divisive and elitist” and concentrate instead on management. The police, like much of the public sector, remain preoccupied with the management ethic, ignoring the words of Viscount Slim p a noted leader in both the army and the commercial world – that “managers are necessary, leaders are essential”.

The result is a service that is too risk averse, frequently process driven and displays all the defensive attitudes of the besieged. Of course there are notable exceptions, but the picture among the senior ranks overall is depressing and getting worse.

Faced with this crisis in leadership, the Home Secretary is proposing that we import people of calibre from the business world and abroad, rather than simply promoting from within. Policemen such as Bill Bratton who ran the New York and Los Angeles police departments, could be made chief constables and businessmen could join at superintendent level.

It carries risks but maybe it’s worth a shot given the circumstances. It is important that foreign officers come from countries with similar common-law legal systems, such as Australia, New Zealand and the US. There are many examples of successful individuals who might be tempted. Well-qualified men and women frequently move around different sectors in industry and commerce, often with great success. So why not within the police?

But I do have one big concern. Few police forces abroad combine in one single body – as happens in the UK – such a wide range of responsibilities such as for common crime, counter-terrrorism, protection of high-risk individuals and crowd control, and all by a largely unarmed workforce. Get it wrong by appointing the wrong individual to a top job, and there is a real risk that the resulting furore could kill off fast-track recruitment, an idea whose time has come.

The police service needs to attract its fair share of top-quality graduates from Russell Group universities, who have all the essential qualities of integrity, common sense, resilience – and the ability to lead. Yet a career in the police service does not figure as an option for high-flying graduates. The service is still seen as a blue-collar occupation even though if offers variety, challenges and an opportunity to change society for the better.

The problem was recognised in the reports by Tom Winsor, now the Chief Inspector of Constabulary, whose aim is to change the service into a white-collar profession. The establishment of a College of Policing, an equivalent to the royal colleges that champion the other professions, to identify and promote best practice is a good move, but everything will depend on attracting and retaining the best talent available.

We need an officer corps. The majority should carry on climbing the ranks as happens now, but we also need an annual intake of 250 or more graduates who should be groomed for leadership. The Home Office’s suggestion of 80 graduates is too little to reach the critical mass necessary to transform the service.

Standards should be demanding; training rigorous; underachievement should lead to culling. All of this is standard in the Armed Forces and the big corporations. It should not be anathema to accelerate these entrants so they reach the rank of chief inspector or superintendent by the age of 30 or so. It happens in the army. Experience on the street is essential, but not for an unrealistically long time, and ranks could be skipped.

Diehards on the service will oppose this, but they have no alternative other than more or the same and look where that has led us.

A two tier system is a good bet for the future. But it will take at least eight years before the new generation of leaders can begin to make itself felt within the police service. The Government is taking a gamble with its idea of bringing in outside talent now. But with the pressing shortage of first-rate candidates for the highest ranks of the police, it’s a gamble that we will probably have to take.

Lord Dear was Chief Constable of the West Midlands from 1985 to 1990 and Her Majesry’s Inspector of Constabulary from 1990 to 1997.

Sir Hugh attacked what was described as Lord Dears' “ill-judged” comments in his response letter....

The President of ACPO has attacked a former chief constable’s “ill-judged” comments that direct entry at superintending ranks and recruiting foreign chief constables could help diminish corruption in the Police Service by securing stronger leaders.

Writing in The Times, Lord Geoffrey Dear, who was West Midlands Police chief constable from 1985 to 1990, said misconduct by senior officers has become more common in recent years. He listed scandals affecting policing such as the Hillsborough investigation, Plebgate, the revelations of the Leveson Inquiry and the “apparent politicisation” of the Fed, claiming: “The basic problem is leadership”.

But ACPO President Sir Hugh Orde (pictured above) was not impressed with this and wrote a letter to the paper that listed cases of alleged corruption or malpractice that occurred while Lord Dear was chief constable.

These were West Midlands Police’s original enquiry into South Yorkshire Police’s handling of the Hillsborough disaster and the disbandment of the West Midlands Crime Squad after discrepancies in the evidence it presented which led to the terrorism convictions of the Birmingham Six being quashed.

Sir Hugh wrote that Lord Dear was, like him, “subject to investigations” as a chief constable, adding: “He should be the last to join smoke and fire.” Sir Hugh wrote of Lord Dear: “He above all should understand the complexities of leading a service that is charged with protecting citizens 24 hours a day, managing risks that span from local to the international.”

He categorised Lord Dear’s comments as an “attack on leadership in policing” and called them “surprising and ill-judged”. Sir Hugh also wrote that the high-profile investigations into allegations of police misconduct were evidence of “our strong culture of accountability rather than endemic failure”.

He said the service did not oppose direct entry and said forces already had senior staff members recruited from outside policing. The Home Office has argued a plus point of direct entry superintendents is that they would bring skills from other disciplines. Sir Hugh also said the typical progression from PC to ACPO rank was 15 years, which he said was six years faster than when Lord Dear was in the service.

“We are lucky in this country to have at the top of our Police Service a group of men and women of outstanding ability, unquestioned integrity, a high level of professionalism and a deep commitment to public service,” he wrote.

Not happy to leave it there, Lord Dear countered with .....

Sir, May I correct the three main inaccuracies in the letter by Sir Hugh Orde (Feb 5)? He relied largely on highly personalised remarks when disagreeing with conclusions in my Opinion article (“Most wanted: new leadership for the police”, Feb 1) .

First, West Midlands Police will almost certainly emerge unscathed from the forthcoming inquiry into the Hillsborough Stadium disaster. For detail, see my address to the House of Lords during the passage of the Police (Complaints and Conduct) Bill —Hansard December 11, 2012.

Second, my disbandment of the West Midlands Serious Crimes Squad in 1989 was surely an example of firm leadership and a demand for high standards, something not always apparent today. Third, during the whole of my police career I was never the subject of either a complaint or a personal investigation.

I take some comfort from the fact that my postbag has grown considerably since Sir Hugh’s letter — all but one signal support for my recommendations.
Lord Dear House of Lords

Leadership and Corruption: The Facts Speak For Themselves

As recently as September 14th last year the Guardian printed an article that spelt out the crisis brewing at the top of English policing after another chief constable was suspended on suspicion of serious misconduct.

Stuart Hyde, the temporary chief of the Cumbria force, was suspended after the police authority examined what it said were allegations that may indicate a breach in standards of professional behaviour.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) has been called in by the force and is making an "immediate and detailed" assessment of the allegations.

Hyde's suspension brings the number of the country's most senior officers who have faced or are facing disciplinary action or investigation by the police watchdog to NINE. It is unprecedented for so many senior serving officers to be the focus of investigations at the same time.

The Cumbria force called in Bernard Lawson, deputy chief constable of Merseyside, to take over the force on Friday, after Hyde's suspension was announced.
In a fortnight the chief constable of Cleveland, Sean Price, will face a closed disciplinary hearing into 11 allegations of gross misconduct. He faces claims he used "undue influence" during the appointment of the daughter of Dave McLuckie, the former police authority chairman, to a civilian post within the force. Price – who is suspended from his post – is also the subject of a criminal investigation. His deputy, Derek Bonnard, faces a disciplinary hearing for eight counts of alleged gross misconduct.

Both were arrested last year as part of the investigation led by the IPCC. The allegations against them include claims of the misuse of public funds and corporate credit cards. Both men deny wrongdoing and have made claims for wrongful arrest.

The police watchdog is also investigating four senior officers from three separate forces over allegations of misconduct and possible criminal offences during a major investigation.

Adrian Lee, chief constable of Northamptonshire,

and his deputy Suzette Davenport;

Jane Sawyers, assistant chief constable with the Staffordshire force;

and Marcus Beale, assistant chief constable with the West Midlands,

are all under criminal investigation.

On behalf of the IPCC, Mick Creedon, Derbyshire chief constable, is examining claims that the officers withheld material and evidence from a murder trial. The four police chiefs have not been suspended from duty or arrested. Their forces have said the investigation does not imply any wrongdoing.

Last May Grahame Maxwell, former chief constable of North Yorkshire, who admitted gross misconduct for helping a relative get a job during a police recruitment campaign, left the force with a £250,000 "golden goodbye". Maxwell, 51, escaped the sack and was given a final written warning after a secret disciplinary hearing. But when the police authority refused to renew his contract it triggered a clause entitling him to £247,636 in compensation. His deputy Adam Briggs – who was also accused of helping a relative get a job during the same recruitment campaign – was disciplined and had a charge of misconduct upheld against him. He has since retired from the force.
AND THERE'S MORE ......

Even more recently, on December 21st 2012, the Telegraph wrote another article listing yet more instances of corrupt or improper practice from our highest qualified and paid police officers.

"In the eyes of its natural supporters, the police force is beginning to look and act like a law unto itself"

England has 39 police forces, headed by 39 chief constables or commissioners. In the past 18 months, seven have been sacked for misconduct, suspended, placed under criminal or disciplinary investigation or forced to resign. That is not far off a fifth of the total.

In the same period, at least eight deputy or assistant chief constables have also been placed under ongoing investigation, suspended or forced out for reasons of alleged misconduct. No fewer than 11 English police forces – just under 30 per cent – have had one or more of their top leaders under a cloud.

Sean Price, chief constable of Cleveland, was sacked in October for gross misconduct and is on bail in a separate criminal investigation for corruption. In the same month, Sir Norman Bettison, chief constable of West Yorkshire, had to resign over his alleged role, which he denies, in concocting false information to smear the victims of the Hillsborough football disaster. He remains under investigation by the Independent Police Complaints Commission, the IPCC.

Also in October, Gordon Fraser, assistant chief constable of Leicestershire, killed himself after being suspended over allegations of gross misconduct and fraud. With his partner, also a serving police officer, he had recently appeared in court on charges of perverting the course of justice.

22 Dec 2012

Stuart Hyde, acting chief constable of Cumbria, has been suspended for alleged misbehaviour.

Grahame Maxwell, chief constable of North Yorkshire, was found guilty of gross misconduct after assisting a relative in a recruitment exercise.

Adrian Lee, chief constable of Northamptonshire, is under IPCC investigation for allegedly withholding crucial evidence from a murder trial. Mr Lee is “chair of professional ethics” for the Association of Chief Police Officers, ACPO. (What was that you were saying Sir Hugh??)

Suzette Davenport, Mr Lee’s deputy at Northamptonshire, Jane Sawyers, assistant chief constable in Staffordshire, and Marcus Beale, assistant chief constable in the West Midlands, are under investigation in the same matter as Mr Lee. Adam Briggs, Mr Maxwell’s deputy in North Yorkshire, was disciplined, too, and has left the force.

Derek Bonnard, Mr Price’s former deputy chief at Cleveland, is suspended.

Craig Denholm, deputy chief constable of Surrey, is under IPCC investigation for allegedly failing to reveal that Milly Dowler’s voicemail had been hacked.

David Ainsworth, deputy chief constable of Wiltshire, hanged himself after facing allegations of sexual misconduct from 13 different women.

Most of these cases have barely been reported outside the local press. But they add up to the most serious spate of alleged wrongdoing at senior levels in the history of the police.

And of course, in July 2011, the most high-profile scalps of all, Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson and his assistant commissioner, John Yates, were claimed at Scotland Yard after the Metropolitan Police’s calamitous failings in the News of the World phone-hacking scandal.

Saving the best until last .....

"All that's necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for enough good men to do nothing." Edmund Burke (British Statesman and Philosopher 1729-1797)"

For many years now, this site has sought to expose the greatest scandal of all, the "Crime of The Century" that is the pernicious and deceitful manipulation of crime statistics and detection numbers. Responsibility rises to the top, to the same Chief Officer rank discussed earlier in the article. Either by encouraging the activities detailed in 200 articles from these pages or condoning them, the Chiefs were and are responsible.

You don't have to stray very far from this sentence to find the evidence. It's all here, in the 200 articles, in recent posts and in the view our reports section to the right, where you will find evidence documented in detailed reports, showing the extent and the methods used to manipulate crime and fool the public.

Further evidence of “Cooking The Books Of Crime” ……. Chief Officers will of course refute any such allegations. However there is plenty of front line officer evidence that confirm that the statistics are not to be trusted.

Rodger Patrick, a retired Detective Chief Inspector from the West Midlands Police and good friend of this site, claimed in the Telegraph as long as three years ao, that manipulative methods are tacitly approved of by senior officers, police watchdogs and the Home Office.
The techniques – dubbed “gaming” – are used to create the illusion that fewer crimes are being committed and that a bigger proportion are being solved.

The claims will inflame the debate about crime statistics after recent figures suggested that crime continues to fall.

The techniques identified by Dr Patrick include:

“Cuffing” – in which officers make crimes disappear from official figures by either recording them as a “false report” or downgrading their seriousness. For example, a robbery in which a mobile phone is stolen with violence or threats of violence is recorded as “theft from the person”, which is not classed as a violent crime.

“Stitching” – from “stitching up”, whereby offenders are charged with a crime when there is insufficient evidence. Police know that prosecutors will never proceed with the case but the crime appears in police records to have been “solved”.
“Skewing” – when police activity is directed at easier-to-solve crimes to boost detection rates, at the expense of more serious offences such as sex crimes or child abuse.

“Nodding” – where clear-up rates are boosted by persuading convicted offenders to admit to crimes they have not committed, in exchange for inducements such as a lower sentence.

Dr Patrick, who researched the subject for a PhD, said: “The academics call this ‘gaming’ but front line police officers would call it fiddling the figures, massaging the books or, the current favourite term, ‘good housekeeping’. It is a bit like the police activities that we all thought stopped in the 1970s.”

The article cited lots of real life examples and one detective, who declined to be named, said: “Name any crime and I’ll tell you how it can be fiddled.”

As a retired Police Officer, I am the author of this blog that specifically exposes the fallacious recording of crime statistics and crime detections over the last twenty years.
I have written many detailed reports and articles exposing the scandal of crime statistics in the UK and have had many exchanges with Senior Police Officers, Government Ministers, including the former Policing Minister Nick Herbert on the subject of manipulated crime statistics. Unfortunately, no-one seems to have the courage to publicly prize the lid off this can off this particular can of worms for fear of reducing public confidence in the police still further.

Do I believe we are enjoying the lowest levels of crime? Definitely not. Do I believe that Chief Constables and Senior Command Teams have suppressed and manipulated crime statistics AND detections for many years …. without doubt.

Adding to the corrupt pernicious manipulation of statistics, with practised deceptions worthy of the criminal fraternity, under Labour administration with performance rewarded targeting, many Chief and Senior officers massively benefited financially from the practices.

Authors of their own misfortune, the Chiefs then had to deal with slashing of budgets and officer numbers as a result of 20 years of alleged crime decreases.

43 forces in England & Wales. Until Labour introduced financial incentives for Chiefs, the 43 forces, as you would expect performed differently, good, bad and middle of the road. Shock of all shocks, Chief Officers were paid 15% bonuses to reflect crime reductions and within a few short years, ALL 43 forces reported consistent drops in crime and increases in detections, using many if not all of the practises referred to earlier.

In come the PCC. It can be no co-incidence that more Chief Officers are currently under suspension or on their way out of the door than has been witnessed previously.

So finally, returning to the exchanges between Lord Dear and Sir Hugh Orde.

Sir Hugh, who are you trying to fool now? There is enough evidence on this page alone to make nonsense of your response to Lord Dear and the personal attacks directed at Mr Dear are merely further evidence of deflection in action. Face up to it, the service needs a root and branch shake up, starting with the leadership. Years of practised deception will make Tom Winsors job at HMIC an unenviable spiders web to disentangle. We doubt he will ever arrive at the complete truth.

The honour and distinction of achieving a high rank in public service has been replaced with greed, with a convenient blindness to the immorality of their actions.

What is the pernicious, deceitful manipulation of recorded crime and detections over a 20 year period, where Chief Officers knowingly accepted 10-15% performance bonuses related to fudged numbers if it isn’t corruption?

The police will never regain our trust until they get decent leadership and smash the so-called ‘canteen culture’ that pervades the force. Now, surely, the game is up. The decent officers, the majority, deserve much better than they have got, and so does the British public.

The Chief Officers who have perpetrated, organised, condoned or turned a blind eye to these and the other scurrilous practices on this and previous pages must be held finally to account for their parts, for it seems that they have smashed their moral compass to pieces.

And finally, Sir Hugh vs Lord Dear .... whose view do I prefer?

Res ipsa loquitor - I'll let the facts speak for themselves

Paul McKeever Tribute Issue of Police Magazine

2013-01-27T10:04:00.002-08:00

Read the January 2013 edition of the Police Federation Police magazine. Click the image above to open the window and read the flip book.

Arrests fall - and so does crime-solving, raising doubts over government claims that the country is becoming more safe | Mail Online

2013-01-27T06:49:00.001-08:00

Arrests fall - and so does crime-solving, raising doubts over government claims that the country is becoming more safe | Mail Online

Jobs-axe cops solve 30,000 fewer crimes - Surrey Constabulary Blog

2013-01-27T04:48:00.001-08:00

Jobs-axe cops solve 30,000 fewer crimes - Surrey Constabulary Blog

Blowing the whistle: The inside story of how targets make policing worse - Crime - UK - The Independent

2013-01-27T04:46:00.001-08:00

Blowing the whistle: The inside story of how targets make policing worse - Crime - UK - The Independent

FINALLY! The truth is out : The Police HAVE been cooking the books of crime for years!

2013-01-26T07:19:00.002-08:00

Crime and detections have been perniciously fiddled for years!

It seems that finally, the truth is out that the police reported crime and detection statistics have been ruthlessly and perniciously fudged and fiddled for years!

In a Daily mail article by Jack Doyle http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2267518/Overall-level-crime-falls-record-low-fears-raised-400-000-offences-logged-police.html police are accused of exaggerating the falls in crime.

The FT, Telegraph, Channel 4 and the Guardian all reported similar articles:-

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/6826ab58-6614-11e2-bb67-00144feab49a.html#axzz2J5fTq96o
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/9823775/Police-exaggerating-fall-in-crime-rate.html
http://www.channel4.com/news/police-accused-of-exaggerating-drop-in-crime-rate
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jul/14/crime-statistics-england-wales

Regular visistors to this site will know I have been demonstrating this for a number of years in the attempt to get someone with the courage to do something about it, to listen and act. Many reports and articles published here, both in prior posts and in greater detail in the view our reports section, illustrate the extent of the scandal and how it is done.

Alan Travis of the Guardian scratches the surface with his comment...

[The figures show] a 41% drop in crime between 2002-03 and 2011-12 for police recorded crime figures, compared with a 26% drop in the crime survey results over the same period.
Statisticians say one explanation for the difference may have been pressure on the police to downgrade incidents in the face of a targets culture. The study says the police figures may overstate the actual long-term fall in crime, especially since 2006-07.

The ONS statisticians say they can't be certain what lies behind this difference but that it could point to a gradual erosion of police compliance with national crime recording standards. Alternatively, it may be the result of "a natural correction" to an over-recording of offences by the police in the early years of the new crime reporting standards. The statisticians say that in the absence of independent audits since 2006-07 it is not possible to give an definitive answer.

The truth is even more explosive and scandalous.

Rodger Patrick, a retired Detective Chief Inspector from the West Midlands Police and a good friend of this site claimed in the Telegraph that manipulative methods are tacitly approved of by senior officers, police watchdogs and the Home Office.

The techniques – dubbed “gaming” – are used to create the illusion that fewer crimes are being committed and that a bigger proportion are being solved.

The claims will inflame the debate about crime statistics after recent figures suggested that crime fell four per cent in the second quarter of last year.

The techniques identified by Dr Patrick include:

“Cuffing” – in which officers make crimes disappear from official figures by either recording them as a “false report” or downgrading their seriousness. For example, a robbery in which a mobile phone is stolen with violence or threats of violence is recorded as “theft from the person”, which is not classed as a violent crime.

“Stitching” – from “stitching up”, whereby offenders are charged with a crime when there is insufficient evidence. Police know that prosecutors will never proceed with the case but the crime appears in police records to have been “solved”.

“Skewing” – when police activity is directed at easier-to-solve crimes to boost detection rates, at the expense of more serious offences such as sex crimes or child abuse. This is a major area of statistical manipulation disguised under the heading "Alternative Disposal Methods".

“Nodding” – where clear-up rates are boosted by persuading convicted offenders to admit to crimes they have not committed, in exchange for inducements such as a lower sentence.

Dr Patrick, who researched the subject for a PhD, said: “The academics call this ‘gaming’ but front line police officers would call it fiddling the figures, massaging the books or, the current favourite term, ‘good housekeeping’. It is a bit like the police activities that we all thought stopped in the 1970s.”

The article cited lots of real life examples and one detective, who declined to be named, said: “Name any crime and I’ll tell you how it can be fiddled.”

As a retired Police Officer, for over 5 years now, I have been the author of this blog that specifically exposes the fallacious recording of crime statistics and crime detections over the last twenty years.

A couple of years ago, I was interviewed on the Politics show about the cuts to police numbers http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00c96jz

On the Thin Blue Line I have written many detailed reports and articles exposing the scandal of crime statistics in the UK and these can be viewed via the “View Our Reports” section. I have had many exchanges with Senior Police Officers, Government Ministers, including the former Policing Minister Nick Herbert on the subject of manipulated crime statistics. Unfortunately, no-one seems to have the courage to publicly prize the lid off this can off this particular can of worms for fear of reducing public confidence in the police still further.

Do I believe we are enjoying the lowest levels of crime? Definitely not. Do I believe that Chief Constables and Senior Command Teams have suppressed and manipulated crime statistics AND detections for many years for political and personal financial gain…. without doubt.

For a flavour of the content on this site have a look at this link which also contains links to many articles penned on the subject http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.co.uk/2010/02/chief-police-officers-and-home-office.html

Here is a simple scenario backed up by facts that illustrates the point succinctly.

Imagine you are the CEO of a national company with 43 branches (There are 43 police forces in England & Wales). Realistically, you would think that the 43 branches would perform differently. Some would be extremely successful, performing well. Also rans might just be ticking along, but there would also be a bunch of branches that under perform.

Prior to the last Labour Government, this was the case with the 43 police forces. Some were effective at controlling crime levels and increasing detections. Others ticked along while a number had clearly lost control of crime on their patch. Tony Blair and his Home Office ministers introduced performance targetting, which rewarded Chief Officers and their higher level command teams with bonus payments to reflect reduced crime and increased detections. Chief Officers, many with £150k plus packages were paid as much as 15% on top to report reduced crime. Hey presto! Within a few short years ALL 43 FORCES suddenly reported massive reductions in crime and increases in detections. Was this all achieved through more effective policing methods or by embracing the culture of "Gaming" as described above? I'll leave you to come to your own conclusion. Knowing the facts I know what I believe.

The examples illustrated here are merely the tip oif a very corrupt iceberg in policing. I lay no blame at thje door of the frontline officers. They are told how to police. The fact remains that a root and branch exposure of this crime of the century, perpetrated by the most senior police officers is required. Chief Officers will of course refute any such allegations, protecting their career and pension. However there is plenty of front line officer evidence in the reports on this site that confirm that the statistics are not to be trusted.

The scandal has more worrying consequences than have been publicised.

Knowing or at least suspecting that the books of crime had been well and truly cooked over the years, this Coalition Government chose to use the fallacious crime statistics as a key motivator for including policing in the comprehensive spending review that led to the massive cuts in police resources and frontline officer numbers.
The police are meant to protect life and property, prevent and detect crime. That is their function, to protect you, me and those who are near and dear to us from the criminal fraternity. This is what the majority of committed police officers want and joined the job to do. Reducing numbers based on fiddled crime statistics ignores this issue completely and endangers the lives and threatens the safety of us all.
Politicians believe what is in their interests to believe and disregard the rest. FACT. They are not really interested in protecting the public whose votes and taxes keep them in office. They are only interested in spinning the numbers out to represent what they want the public to believe.

Will the appointment of locally elected police commissioners make a difference? Don't hold your breath on that one. Until the 43 newly appointed officials act as one on this, you can bet that they will consider their own career prospects before opening this can of worms.

For years now, I have advocated that it would take a courageous politician to stand up and be counted and rip this fiasco of crime statistics apart. Decreasing crime is a vote winner, however suspect the numbers. Until that brave person steps forward, confidence in the justice system will never return. The public are no longer fooled by the lies that have been perpetrated. Far better to clear the decks, admit that the numbers are crooked and flawed, then start again with a clean slate. Only then will we know what level of support is truly needed to police the community that way it wants and deserves.

Politicians, Police Commissioners, Her Majesties Inspector of Police... To you all I throw down the challenge... Do you have the honesty, integrity and courage to discover and expose the truth?

For all our sakes, I hope so.

Steve Bennett
Retired Police Officer
Thin Blue Line

Paul McKeever - Police Federation Chairman - Rest In Peace

2013-01-21T02:43:00.000-08:00

Paul McKeever - May You Rest In Peace

It is with a heavy heart and great sadness that I heard the news of the passing of Paul McKeever.

A lifelong serving policeman, Paul gave everything to the service. He fought long and hard for the rights of the federated ranks, never shirking the challenges presented by this and previous Governments that threaten the livelihoods of our beloved officers.

Paul was a true gentleman. He bravely stood up to the Home Secretary and spoke passionately at the 2011 conference in defence of the troops.

I met with Paul on a number of occasions and was in regular contact. He was a keen supporter of the police blogs as a means of attempting to draw attention to the plight of the frontline officers. He was eloquent and educated in his often vociferous exchanges with senior officers and Government Ministers and there can be no doubt that he will be sadly missed by everyone who had the good fortune to meet and work with him.

Paul was just two weeks away from retirement, having announced his departure last summer. At the time he said: "I cannot stay within a service that is having the Office of Constable attacked, police officers denigrated and public safety put at risk." He had also accused Theresa May of being "on the precipice of destroying a police service that is admired and replicated throughout the world".

Pauls brave words and noble actions sum up the feeling within the service. The burden carried by Paul placed obvios strains on a good man who genuinely wanted the best for the service and the public it serves. He believed, as many do, that Mrs May and this Government treated the service in a despicable and undeserved fashion. Shame on you all.

Paul never gave up his part in the fight to bring justice to the killers of WPC Yvonne Fletcher. Let us hope that one day justice will be seen to be done.

Our thoughts and condolences at this sad time to his wife Charmian and their daughter Henrietta.

A Fed rep since 1992, he was a trustee to the Police Dependents Trust, Chairman of the National Police Memorial Day Trust and a Director of the Metropolitan Police Friendly Society.

Outside policing, he was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and the Royal Institution. He was also a member of the Institute of Directors.

He enjoyed hill walking and took many trips to the Tyrol region of Austria and walked on the Downs with his spaniel, Hetty. He also enjoyed the Telegraph crossword and watching Harlequins, West Ham and Celtic.

A condolence and tribute page has been created on the Police Federation website. Anyone wishing to send messages of tribute and condolence can do so by emailing: Tributes@polfed.org.

Thank you Paul for everything you gave in all your proud years.

God bless and may you rest in peace.

Steve Bennett
Retired West Midlands Police Officer

WHERE ARE THE POLICE? 2012 UPDATE

2012-09-30T21:15:00.000-07:00

Two years forward from our research and article about what the Police actually do, it seems very little has been accomplished in returning frontline officers to what they would rather be doing, preventing and detecting crime. See our previous post and the PDF document "Where are all the police officers" in the link in the sidebar.

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.com/2010/08/where-are-all-police-officers.html

Bobbies on the beat

Sep 28th 2012, 15:14 by M.S.

REPRINTED FROM THE ECONOMIST

http://www.economist.com/blogs/blighty/2012/09/policing-britain#comments

WHAT do the police actually do? There’s an assumption by most sentient (ie, TV-watching) beings that they should be either out catching murderers or collaring hoodies who heave stones through old ladies’ windows. The police themselves will tell you they still waste far too much time ticking boxes and filling in forms.

A new study by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC)--whose respected head, Sir Denis O’Connor, retires on Sunday--suggests that frontline police do, in fact, spend about 80% of their time on activities related to crime, however tangentially. But they should focus more on preventing crime, it concludes, not just huffing up to the scene afterwards. That this should need saying, nearly 200 years after Robert Peel pronounced crime prevention the central task of policing, is a story in itself.

The first problem, the HMIC maintains, after sifting through 4.6m substantive incidents recorded by six forces and observing 36 shifts, is that the police don’t actually know what they are supposed to be focusing on. All six forces had different mission statements and only one referred explicitly to preventing crime. In part because the policing mission is ill defined and in part because other agencies may be slow or reluctant to respond, police resources go on looking after the elderly, the ill and the abandoned when an ambulance fails to turn up or social services proves to have closed at 5pm.

Another problem is that the training of most officers dwells more on using police powers legally than on using them to fight crime effectively (CID training is an exception). In initial training just one module out of 190 is on evidence-based approaches to crime prevention, and it is not reinforced later in practice.

A third, the HMIC says, is that the police on the street often don’t get good information about the incidents they have to deal with, so they either deal with them poorly or take too much time doing it properly. This is partly a matter of patchy and poor kit, partly a matter of mindset--what information they do receive tends to be reactive rather than predictive. Both gaps were stunningly in evidence during the riots in August 2011.

There are certainly flickers of inventiveness. A basic command unit in one of the forces studied has pioneered a technique of “predictive mapping” on burglaries to deploy staff to high-risk areas at specific times, and along with other measures this has brought about a significant fall in that type of crime. In the run-up to the Olympic games, another force pulled together intelligence gleaned by monitoring sentiment and mood across social media and made it available to officers to deter criminal gangs and homegrown extremists. But such examples stand out. More typically the reliance on experience over knowledge encourages a “craft-based professionalism” that helps forces get by but doesn’t help them get ahead of demand.

All this matters because the police, like everyone else, are being required to improve or at least maintain their levels of service with less money, and no one doubts that more budget cuts are coming. Some of the lower-hanging fiscal fruit has been plucked; forces have started sharing facilities, outsourcing activities and laying off staff. But their most important assets are sworn police officers, and how effective they are, individually and out of the station, will be crucial in achieving more with less. With so much reform in the air—an overhaul of police pay and condtions, elected police and crime commissioners, a new College of Policing, and innovation forced on forces by fiscal necessity—the HMIC is surely right to urge a renewed focus on defining, training and equipping frontline police officers to act effectively in the field as independent professionals.

Incidentally, the HMIC figures show that 17% of recorded incidents to do with public safety and welfare (which make up 40% of all incidents) were hoax calls or abandoned calls to emergency services. That sounds like an awful lot. Expensive, too.

POLITICAL POLICING - CRIME COMMISSIONERS

2012-06-24T05:02:00.001-07:00

Much has been written about the thorny subject of Locally Elected Crime Commissioners, the elections for which are due to be held on 15th November 2012. We will not enter into the rights and wrongs of the idealogy, rather we will watch with interest and say only: "Res Ipsa Loquitor" - Let the facts speak for themselves.

The point of police and crime commissioners, we are told, is to increase the democratic accountability of the 41 police forces in England and Wales outside London.

Ministers felt police authorities were not sufficiently responsive to the demands of an anxious citizenry. Chief constables needed someone with electoral clout to connect them to the people, to keep them honest.
Elections will be held in November and the first potential candidates are emerging. The concern, however, is that this American-inspired model of police accountability may not translate easily into English or Welsh.
The principles enshrined by the father of our modern police force, Sir Robert Peel, are to be found in the General Instructions given to the first Metropolitan Police officers in 1829.

Number five of nine states that it is the duty of officers "to seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion; but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing".

British tradition has it that, to retain its legitimacy, the police service cannot allow itself to be politicised. Accountable, yes. Political, never.

How then, can the Government claim that the service will not become politicised, when the vast majority of candidates so far putting themselves forward for the respective roles, are from one of the political parties?
Look at the list for yourself, then see the table below to see which party looks set to take control of policing in your area.

http://www.police-foundation.org.uk/files/POLICE0001/Policy%20work/PCC%20Candidates.pdf

	Con	Lab	Lib	Indep	English Democrats	UKIP	Other
Avon and Somerset	2	2	3
Bedfordshire	5	3
Cambridgeshire	5	2		2	1		1
Cheshire		2		1
Cleveland		5		3
Cumbria
Derbyshire	2	4		2
Devon and Cornwall	7	2		1
Dorset	2	1	1	2
Durham	2	3		2			1
Dyfed-Powys
Essex	4	2		1	1
Gloucestershire	5	1		2
Greater Manchester	1	4	1	1	1
Gwent		3		3
Hampshire	7	2
Hertfordshire	3	1
Humberside	1	5
Kent	8	2		4
Lancashire	3	4					1
Leicestershire	5	4		2
Lincolnshire	2	2		1	1
Merseyside		4
Norfolk	3	2		1
North Wales		3		1		1
North Yorkshire	7	1		2
Northamptonshire	1	3		2
Northumbria	2	8	1				1
Nottinghamshire	2	4
South Wales		2		1
South Yorkshire		4
Staffordshire	2	2
Suffolk	3	2
Surrey	2	1	1	1
Sussex	7	2		4			1
Thames Valley	3	2					1
Warwickshire	3	3
West Mercia	4	1
West Midlands	2	3	1
West Yorkshire		1		2
Wiltshire		1
	105	103	8	41	4	1	6

Whilst there is an equal split of candidates between the two main parties, it is evident that those splits are not as equal in the respective force areas, suggesting the political colour of policing in certain forces looks set to be dominated by political persuasion.

So here's the dilemma. How can you increase the democratic influence upon chief constables without undermining their independence?

The government's answer is to separate the strategic from the operational, with a layer of oversight to make sure it happens that way. Commissioners will formulate the policing plan, leaving chief constables to decide how best to achieve it with a panel of local politicians and lay members to ensure fair play.

But many police leaders remain profoundly uneasy about what will happen in practice. "All chief constables are quite cautious as we go into this period," says Sara Thornton, vice-president of the Association of Chief Police Officers and head of Thames Valley.

"individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing” Sir Robert Peel's 1829 instructions to police

It now appears certain that elections for commissioners next November will include candidates badged to political parties. Former Labour ministers have said they will stand and some Conservatives look set to campaign on a Tory ticket.

Democracy and political tribalism are so intertwined in the UK that hopes the elections could be conducted in a non-partisan, practical, grassroots way have been dashed. Although independents will fight for votes, they fear party machines will crush all but the most well-known local candidates.

This has led to even greater anxiety that the huge constituencies - some well over two and a half million souls - will see their police priorities influenced by the core voters from the political heartlands of a successful party candidate.

The neighbourhoods where people are least likely to vote are the same communities with the greatest risk of crime. If democratic accountability is about reflecting the views of those who vote, independent policing is about protecting the lives of those who do not.

Will the checks and balances of the system ensure their needs are not ignored? And what happens when the commissioner's democratic mandate clashes with the chief constable's independent principle?

And is there a risk commissioners might ignore the needs of those who didn't vote for them? The architect of this new model, Tory peer Lord Wasserman, thinks not.

"If anybody ignores great chunks of their community and allows crime in particular council estates where there are very few voters to rise, I think he will be exposed and he will be hammered," he tells me.

Who by?

"I'm relying on the community activists, I'm relying on the media, but I'm relying on far more than that. I'm relying on the community, and I want the community to feel that it has a role to play, and I think this will happen."

That, perhaps, is the real question posed by the introduction of police and crime commissioners. Is our local democracy good enough to keep them honest?

Two points spring to mind in conclusion.

1. Whatever the Government say, politicization of the service looks inevitable. An already fragmented service will face the future difficulty of one force adhering to the political preferences of the elected commissioner, whereas its neighboring force may be playing by completely different principles. Regardless of the alleged honorable intentions of the Home Office with its printed objectives for the project, the temptation to influence decision making along political agendas will become irresistible.
2. Locally Elected Crime Commissioners are appointed to follow the Home Secretary's focus on the reduction of crime which carries with it the implicit increase in detection's. For a number of years now, we have tried to educate readers about the "Crime Of The Century" (see previous posts). Crime statistics have been fiddled mercilessly and disgracefully for many years by successive Chief Officers and their management teams. Whether for political, career or financial gain, the fact remains that the public have been conned into believing that crime is reducing and detection's are increasing at a greater rate than is actually experienced. Indeed, it has even been suggested that the fallacious and dramatic drop in crime was largely responsible for policing NOT to be ring fenced in the comprehensive spending review. We have all witnessed events since then, with swingeing cuts to essential front-line services. With the books of crime being so corruptly "cooked", we would maintain that actual crime figures and genuinely low primary detection rates that sit behind the fiddled set, would have forced any Government to take heed of protecting not decimating the service.

Rephrasing the question above, Is our local democracy good enough to MAKE them honest?

‘Fiddling the figures’, ‘Cooking the books’ or ‘Good housekeeping'?

2012-03-20T23:42:00.009-07:00

Readers might enjoy this submission by Dr Rodger Patrick to the Justice Committee.

Dr Patrick is recognised as expert in the field of exposing "Gaming" or the manipulation of crime figures by police forces to reflect improved performance.

www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmjust/writev/foi/foi.pdf

It is also worth having a look at the West Midlands Police submission on behalf of ACPO later in the link above.

Ironic that Dr Patrick used the FOI to expose the failings of the IPCC by accessing internal reports from the West Mids Police and the Chief Constable now suggests that submissions raking over investigations conducted by the IPCC should be barred.

Written evidence from Dr. Rodger Patrick

Executive Summary:

The provisions of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 were utilised to access the evidence to
substantiate the Doctoral Study, and subsequent academic articles, on the impact of Performance Management on the Police Service in England and Wales. Reflections on the experience of using the legislation as an academic device are outlined in the submission, as are examples of the type of information disclosed. It was established that the Act was a powerful means of accessing information with the potential to facilitate greater accountability. However, on its own it cannot ensure reform and further legislation may be necessary to realise its overarching objectives.

1. Rationale for utilising the Freedom of Information Act (FOI) as a research tool:

1.1 Participant observations as a Chief Inspector in the West Midlands Police had identified ‘gaming’ behaviour as an unintended consequence of Performance Management introduced as a means of improving Police governance and accountability. However earlier disclosures of similar perverse behaviours by practitioners (Young 1991) had been unable to establish an empirical pattern and was weakened by a lack of corroboration. The Police Federation had also responded to their members’ concerns by highlighting ‘gaming’ behaviours at their national conference in 2007 but were accused by the then Policing Minister Tony McNulty of ‘over‐egging the cake’.

The introduction of the Freedom of Information Act provided a means of accessing unpublished documents and detailed official statistics, thus addressing these methodological limitations.

1.2 Observations had identified four distinct categories of perverse behaviours designed to improve performance by unethical means, or give the false impression performance had improved. Such behaviours are referred to colloquially as ‘fiddling the figures’, ‘cooking the books’ or ‘good housekeeping’. In the academic literature they are referred to as ‘gaming’ behaviour and there is a body of theory on the subject (De Bruijn 2001 2007, Le Grand 2003 and Bevan & Hood 2006)

1.3 The four categories of ‘gaming’ behaviours identified are defined as follows:

• Cuffing: The under‐recording of reported crimes, the term being derived from the magician’s
art of making objects disappear up the sleeve or cuff (Young 1991).

• Nodding: This involves collusion between officers and suspects to admit to large numbers of
offences, usually whilst in prison after sentence, in return for favours such as reduced
sentences, access to partners, drugs or alcohol. The term is used to describe the act of a
prisoner pointing out or ‘nodding’ at locations where they claim to have committed
offences. (Wilson et al 2001:63)

• Skewing: This involves moving resources from areas of activity which are not subject to
performance measures in order to improve performance in areas that are monitored for
control purposes (Rogerson 1995).

• Stitching: This includes a variety of malpractices designed to enhance the strength of the
evidence against a suspect in order to ensure the desired criminal justice outcome.
Fabricating evidence or stitching someone up are forms of this behaviour.

1.4 All of these ‘gaming’ behaviours were operating in the West Midlands Police during the period 1996 to 1999 and had a major impact on the force’s performance (Patrick 2004, 2009 2011 2012a 2012b). In combination they can be regarded as a ‘perverse policing model’. The statistical profile of the force during this period provided a template for identifying similar practices in other forces.

1.5 Various ‘events’, some in response to the behaviours being uncovered by regulators or specific incidents which had the potential to become scandals, had resulted in the force conducting reviews of the concerning behaviours. The resulting documentation, much of which was completed prior to the introduction of the Freedom of Information Act (FOI), was never intended for public consumption. However when presented with a FOI request, the force released the documents. Many of these reports quantified the scale of the behaviours and by supplementing this information with analysis of national performance data it was possible to calculate the extent to which ‘gaming’ behaviour distorted results.

2. Use of the FOI Act to conduct an academic survey:

2.1 The introduction of a False Reporting Policy in the West Midlands Police in 2004 corresponded with a marked reduction in reported crime. It was argued that this represented a return to an evidential crime recording standard and the associated ‘cuffing’ (Patrick 2011). This demonstrated a flaw in the National Crime Recording Standard introduced in April 2002 with the stated objective of standardising crime recording procedures and eliminating such distortions. In order to establish if other forces had experienced similar reductions, when they introduced such a policy, all forces in England and Wales were sent a questionnaire under the provisions of the Act asking them to supply copies of any false reporting policy.

2.2 They were also asked to provide any analytical assessment of the problem of false reporting
completed under the National Intelligence Model (NIM) and any Impact Assessment completed on the policy under the provisions of the Race Relations (Amendment) Act. It was hoped the National Intelligence Model assessment would quantify the scale of the potential threat from what was believed to be the bogus reporting of crime in pursuit of fraudulent insurance claims.

The Impact Assessments should have been completed as the re‐introduction of greater discretion into the crime recording process could be influenced by officer bias. Again some quantifiable results were being sought.

2.3 A 100% response rate was achieved. The identification of those forces operating ‘false reporting’ policies enabled a statistical analysis to be completed and this supported the hypothesis that the crime recording standard had reverted back to its pre NCRS interpretation. Unpublished data on the number of crimes which had been declassified as crimes i.e. ‘no crimed’, was released by the Home Office and this strengthened the academic argument.

2.4 Only two of the forces to have introduced false reporting policies had conducted NIM
assessments on the threat and neither supported the introduction of the policy. None of the
identified forces had carried out comprehensive impact assessments on the re‐introduction of
discretion into the crime recording procedures although one had identified the potentially
discriminatory consequences of the refusal to issue crime numbers to those reporting passports
stolen.

2.5 The ‘evidence of absence’ is a valuable facet of the Act and proved valuable when exploring why the Home Office ceased publishing the validation tests they carried out on the police recording rates in the British Crime Survey (BCS). A FOI request established that they ceased asking the relevant questions in the 2006/7 survey despite the fact that the results in 2005/6 indicated ‘under recording’ was increasing (Walker, Kershaw and Nicholas: 2006:52).

3 Accessing Statistics:

3.1 In order to quantify the extent of ‘nodding’, associated with abuse of the Offences Taken into
Consideration (TIC) procedures, it was necessary to analyse the impact of preventative action on the number of offences detected as TICs. The Home Office again released the data in response to a Freedom of Information request and the scale of the abuse could be estimated from the fall in TICs after the incident or scandal which stimulated the remedial action. A consistent and compelling pattern was evident in all the cases examined (Patrick 2012a).

4 Accessing Confidential Documents:

4.1 The information contained within sensitive and confidential documents had a major impact on the direction of the research and the conclusions reached. Whilst participant observation and
knowledge of procedures was a great benefit, the willingness of organisations to comply with the
statutory requirements was commendable. The release of a confidential force inspection report
completed by Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary (HMIC 1998) stimulated interest in the way regulators addressed ‘gaming’ when it was uncovered. It was clear from this document that HMIC were aware as early as 1998 that post sentence admissions, Prison Write Offs, were being converted to TICs and that the practice was prone to abuse.

4.2 A draft report on Nottingham Constabulary, following the Chief Constable’s admission that the force was struggling to cope with a marked rise in gang related murders, revealed that the redeployment of officers from specialist HQ squads to local policing units had not gone well. This
‘skewing’ of resources in favour of more affluent areas had been identified in the West Midlands and it appeared, in both cases, that it could have contributed to the rise in gang related crime or
curtailed these forces’ ability to respond to the emerging threat. The paragraph referring to this was omitted from the published version of the report.

4.3 Confidential documents released by one force facilitated an assessment of the capabilities of the Independent Police Complaints Commission. The documents challenged their findings on an
important investigation triggered by the death of a child (Patrick 2012b).

5. The Appeals Process:

5.1 In order to pursue the hypothesis that regulators may be pressurising forces to introduce
‘gaming’ type behaviours to improve their performance, information was requested from the Police Standards Unit (PSU). Specifically sought were their assessments and recommendations on West Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire police forces. It was known that both forces had experienced ‘gaming’ type problems during the late 1990s/early 2000s and the remedial action no doubt contributed to their low station on the national league tables. Their performance improved markedly after Police Standard Unit intervention and examination of their performance profiles suggested ‘nodding’ and ‘cuffing’ had been resurrected. The request for full disclosure was refused and this led to an appeal to the Information Commissioner.

5.2 Whilst the Information Commissioner found in favour of the appeal, the process took over three years to complete. This is believed to be due to a lack of resources at the Information
Commissioner’s Office and is something the Committee may wish to comment on.

6. The scope of Organisations subject to the provisions of the Act:

6.1 The Act was again to prove invaluable when studying the behaviour of the regulators. In 2006 problems with the impact of ‘gaming’ on the reliability of detection data appeared to be behind the decision to audit a range of detections which did not involve the charging of a suspect. Contrary to long established practice the results were not published by Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary (HMIC). However, despite the fact that HMIC are not subject to the provisions of the Act, they responded to a request from an unknown applicant and published the results on their web site. The exclusion of HMIC from the Act may be something the Committee may wish to review.

6.2 The audit of detections highlighted major quality failings, including insufficiency of evidence, in relation to cautions, penalty notices and informal warnings. Such deficiencies would have
implications for the Criminal Record Bureau and the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) who administer the Police National Computer (PNC). The use of the FOI to follow the documentary trail was not an option in relation to ACPO as this organisation is not covered by the Act. Again the Committee may wish to review the organisations covered by the legislation.

7. The Operating Philosophy of the Information Commissioner:

7.1 The evidential ‘blind spot’ in relation to ACPO was partially overcome when they wrote to the Information Commissioner admitting that the audit of detections had uncovered potential breaches of the Data Protection Act. All the documentation in relation to this exchange was released by the Commissioner’s Office. The subject of the correspondence was encapsulated by the following disclosure:

“From my perspective I am most concerned that individuals were not being informed that
they were considered to be the perpetrator of an offence even though this did not involve a
legal process, especially if such information could be used in future Enhanced Disclosure
relating to them. This clearly breaches the requirement of the first data protection principle
that the processing of personal data must be done fairly. I am also worried by the sufficiency
of evidence used. If a police force is going to label an individual as the de facto perpetrator
then they must have a good objective reason for doing so. Not having this could lead to a
record being viewed as inadequate or inaccurate (breaches of the third and fourth principles
respectively).” (Information Commissioner 26.3.2007: Unpublished)

7.2 Whilst ACPO were less than candid about the scale and nature of the ‘insufficiency of evidence’ uncovered by the audit, the decision by the Information Commissioner not to alert the public to the risk they had been exposed to demonstrated a tendency towards a ‘professional body’ approach to regulation, as opposed to a ‘democratic model’ where information is made available to the public in order for them to hold officials to account:

“I would prefer to work with chief officers to ensure compliance. I would like to know more
detail about how this has come about and what action is being taken to ensure future
compliance” (Information Commissioner 26.3.2007: Unpublished)

7.3 The reply from ACPO disclosed the fact that the Home Office and HMIC were also aware of the nature of the problem:

“Please rest assured that the issues that have come to light as a result of the recent Association of Chief Police Officers’ and HMIC audits have been taken extremely seriously by the police service. To this end a series of meetings have taken place in fast time with all relevant parties, including the Home Office, to consider how best to address the concerns that you raised to which we are alive” (ACPO letter to the Information Commissioner 10.4.2007: Unpublished)

8. Conclusion/Discussion

8.1. The provisions of the Freedom of Information Act were an invaluable research tool overcoming a number of methodological limitations faced by previous studies. Whilst the findings could be damaging to the State, thus defeating the desired objective of enhancing public trust, research in this area suggests that such loss of trust can be transient (Van de Walle et al 2008). So in the medium to long term, greater transparency will lead to reform and better governance thus vindicating those who introduced the legislation.

8.2 It should also be borne in mind that the study referred to benefited from an element of surprise and many of the documents relied upon preceded the enactment of the legislation. Anecdotal evidence would suggest such candid documents are being shredded. It could also be surmised that they may not be commissioned at all. If this were to be the case then it could be argued the Act has been counterproductive.

8.3 The Information Commissioner appeared to give voice to this concern in Plymouth City Council Vs BBC (2006) (ICO Ref FS50082254). In this case the BBC had requested full disclosure of the documents submitted to a serious case review into the death of a child by individual agencies. The Information Commissioner judged that the disclosure of the reviews conducted by individual agencies may deter them from being open thus limiting the ability to learn from experience. This rational was challenged by the deliberations following the death of Baby P.

8.4 Whilst the reluctance of Chief Officers to disclose relevant information to regulators or other
forms of official inquiry can be addressed by legislation and conferring greater powers on
investigators, this will be to no avail if the regulators themselves are not committed to making their findings public. The failure of the Financial Services Authority was a damning indictment of this approach. Structurally this flaw may be alleviated by aligning the regulators to Parliament and its Scrutiny Committees may be the most appropriate bodies to oversee their work.

8.5 Another consideration raised by the study was the means by which information uncovered by Freedom of Information requests is disseminated to the general public. Many of the documents disclosed were not made public or easily accessible on the web sites of the originating organisations, including the Information Commissioner’s Office. This is seen as good practice but is not a statutory requirement. The media is one outlet but they have their own agenda and move on quickly to the next breaking story (Howard & Waisbord 2004). Academic articles are one outlet but publication is slow. The official regulators appear to be the most obvious recipient but as can be seen from the evidence presented appropriate action may not follow.

8.6 In relation to the information uncovered by this study the most appropriate outlet would appear to be the Parliamentary Scrutiny Committees. Certainly something needs to be done for those citizens who have police records which are not justified. Witness testimonies and analysis of the Home Office data would suggest the same problems are occurring with offences dealt with as Restorative or Community Resolutions. It may be worth the Scrutiny Committees considering making themselves more accessible to un‐solicited submissions.
January 2012

References:
Bevan & Hood (2006). What’s Measured is What Matters: Targets and Gaming in the English Public Health Care System. Public Administration Vol. 84, No 3, 2006 (517‐538)
De Bruijn, H. (2002). Performance measurement in the public sector. (London Routledge
Her Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary (1998). An Audit Report by Her Majesty’s Inspector of
Constabulary completed on the West Midlands Police in December 1998.Not published: available via Freedom of Information request to the West Midlands Police.
Howard T. & S. R. Waisbord (2004). Political Scandals and Media Across Democracies, Volume II
AMERICAN BEHAVIORAL SCIENTIST, Vol. 47 No. 9, May 2004 1143‐1152
Le Grand J. (2003). Motivation, Agency and Public Policy. Oxford University Press.
Patrick, R. (2004). The Lot of the Poor is Unlikely to Improve Until They Have a Greater Say in Their ‘lot’: Going Local and the Impact on the Distribution of Public Services. Vista Perspectives on Probation and Criminal Justice & Civil Renewal Vol. 9 No. 3 2004.
Patrick R. (2009) Performance Management, Gaming and Police Practice: A Study of Changing Police Behaviour in England and Wales During the Era of New Public Management. University of
Birmingham. PhD Thesis.
Patrick, R. (2011). ‘Reading Tea Leaves’ an assessment of the reliability of police recorded crime
statistics. The Police Journal, Volume 84 (2011) pgs. 47‐67.
Patrick, R. (2012a). ‘A Nod and a Wink’: Do ‘gaming practices’ provide an insight into the
organisational nature of police corruption? (The Police Journal. Accepted for publication,11.3.11
Ref.: Ms. No. PJ‐D‐10529R1).
Patrick, R. (2012b). 'Public Champions or Protectors of Professional Interests?' Observations on the performance of those bodies entrusted with the regulation of the Police Service during the era of New Public Management’ (The Police Journal. Accepted for publication 17.6.2011 Ref.: Ms. No. PJ‐D‐11536R1)
Rogerson, P. (1995) Performance Measurement and Policing: Police Service or Law Enforcement
Agency? Public Money & Management, October‐December 1995
Van de Walle Steven., Steven Van Roosbroek and Geert Bouckaert (2008) Trust in the
public sector: is there any evidence for a long-term decline? International Review of
Administrative Sciences 2008; 74; 47
Walker A., Kershaw C. & Nicholas S. (2006). Crime in England and Wales 2005/2006 Home Office, London
Wilson, D., J.Ashton, & D. Sharp (2001). What Everyone in Britain Should Know About the Police. Blackstone.
Young, M. (1991). An Inside Job. Policing and Police Culture in Britain. Oxford: Claredon Press

GUEST POST - MICHAEL BUNTING - A FAIR COP

2012-01-21T17:25:00.000-08:00

With special thanks to Dave Hasney over at Bankside Babble for his book review. I uploaded the book today and couldn't put it down until I'd read the last word. Any serving, retired or former police officer that reads this book must surely think "There but for the grace of God Go I ... "

The true story of a young police officer’s imprisonment for a crime he did not commit. It was Michael Bunting's life ambition to follow in his father's footsteps and become a police officer. But six years after his family watch him pass out and begin his life's dream, he is serving a sentence for a crime he didn't commit. This is his story.

Beaten almost senseless as he tried to arrest a violent criminal, the 23-year-old PC was left with head injuries and blurred vision that took him months to recover from. Back at work he was astounded to learn that his attacker had filed a complaint against him and that the Police Discipline and Complaints Department were following up the allegation.

Two years later he was found guilty of common assault against his assailant and received a prison sentence that left him living his devastated life amongst the criminals he had previously sought to keep off the streets. Hard-hitting and at times heart-breaking the book is a graphic account of life behind bars for a policeman in one of England's hardest prisons.

An extract from A Fair Cop:"The prisoner arrived once more with the trolley and placed the plate of food on to my hatch. 'Bunting,' he shouted pleasantly. I wasn't fooled. 'Thanks,' I said, as I walked across the cell to collect it. As I put my hand out to reach for the plate he snatched it away. He held it up to the hatch and peered through at me. 'PC Bunting, isn't it?' he asked, and then took a deep breath to muster as much saliva from the back of his throat as he could. With one swift movement he spat a big glob in to the middle of the food. The white phlegm floated around in brown gravy. 'Hey lads, I'm feeding the pig,' he said. With this, two other prisoners came to my cell hatch. They looked at me, sniggering. They then spat in my food too. The first prisoner put the plate on the hatch and gestured for me to come closer. 'You're in our territory now, you f***ing filth, and we're gonna f***ing carve you up.'

About the Author

Following his prison sentence, Michael Bunting was dismissed from the police force. He now runs a successful sports injury clinic and is currently working as a lecturer for the company with which he trained upon his release from prison. He spent the first four years after his release writing A Fair Cop.

Visit Michaels website at http://www.afaircop.co.uk/ His blog link now appears in our favourite police blog links to the right of this page.

IS IT TIME TO BRING BACK NATIONAL SERVICE?

2011-08-10T04:26:00.000-07:00

Years of liberal dogma have spawned a generation of amoral, uneducated, welfare dependent, brutalised youngsters

By Max Hastings
10th August 2011

In an excellent article reprinted lower down this page, Max Hastings hits the nail on the head about the generation of yobs that have shown their tru colours on our city streets.

The only recommendation I would add is that surely the events of the last few days show us that it is time to bering back National Service.

Surveys have shown that the majority of Britons want National Service to be reintroduced. About 69 per cent think that compulsory military service would curb the country's growing yob culture and cut crime.

The survey, by GfK Media, found that 65 per cent of adults think National Service should be used to reduce overcrowding in prisons. National Service ran from 1945 to 1963, with 2.5 million young men conscripted. They were used as part of the 100,000-strong occupation force in post-war Germany, to police Palestine and protect Aden and the Suez Canal Zone. Some had an easier time in Singapore, Hong Kong and lesser military bases.

Although no politicians have called for National Service to be reintroduced to deal with youth crime and misbehaviour, similar style community work schemes have been put forward. Gordon Brown, when Chancellor, unveiled a multi-million government scheme, supported by industry, to fund gap years for young people to do voluntary work in Britain and abroad.

David Cameron, the Tory Party leader, recently suggested a compulsory period of up to four months' voluntary work for all school-leavers. According to this survey of 1,266 adults, carried out for ITV's Bad Lad's Army programme, 87 per cent worry about Britain's yob culture.

Only 19 per cent thought that a spell in the military would not stop youngsters behaving badly. When asked how long that spell should be, two years received the biggest vote, with 33 per cent, and 61 per cent saying that women should do their bit as well as men.

AND NOW OVER TO MAX FOR A DOSE OF COMMON SENSE . . . .

A few weeks after the U.S. city of Detroit was ravaged by 1967 race riots in which 43 people died, I was shown around the wrecked areas by a black reporter named Joe Strickland.

He said: ‘Don’t you believe all that stuff people here are giving media folk about how sorry they are about what happened. When they talk to each other, they say: “It was a great fire, man!” ’

I am sure that is what many of the young rioters, black and white, who have burned and looted in England through the past few shocking nights think today.

Manchester: Hooded looters with arm fulls of clothes run from a Manchester shopping centre yesterday evening

It was fun. It made life interesting. It got people to notice them. As a girl looter told a BBC reporter, it showed ‘the rich’ and the police that ‘we can do what we like’.

If you live a normal life of absolute futility, which we can assume most of this week’s rioters do, excitement of any kind is welcome. The people who wrecked swathes of property, burned vehicles and terrorised communities have no moral compass to make them susceptible to guilt or shame.

Most have no jobs to go to or exams they might pass. They know no family role models, for most live in homes in which the father is unemployed, or from which he has decamped.

They are illiterate and innumerate, beyond maybe some dexterity with computer games and BlackBerries.

They are essentially wild beasts. I use that phrase advisedly, because it seems appropriate to young people bereft of the discipline that might make them employable; of the conscience that distinguishes between right and wrong.

They respond only to instinctive animal impulses — to eat and drink, have sex, seize or destroy the accessible property of others.

Their behaviour on the streets resembled that of the polar bear which attacked a Norwegian tourist camp last week. They were doing what came naturally and, unlike the bear, no one even shot them for it.

A former London police chief spoke a few years ago about the ‘feral children’ on his patch — another way of describing the same reality.

The depressing truth is that at the bottom of our society is a layer of young people with no skills, education, values or aspirations. They do not have what most of us would call ‘lives’: they simply exist.

Nobody has ever dared suggest to them that they need feel any allegiance to anything, least of all Britain or their community. They do not watch royal weddings or notice Test matches or take pride in being Londoners or Scousers or Brummies.

Not only do they know nothing of Britain’s past, they care nothing for its present.

They have their being only in video games and street-fights, casual drug use and crime, sometimes petty, sometimes serious.

The notions of doing a nine-to-five job, marrying and sticking with a wife and kids, taking up DIY or learning to read properly, are beyond their imaginations.

Undercover police officers have arrest looters in the Swarovski Crystal shop in Manchester. One looter lies injured and blood can be seen on the wall

Last week, I met a charity worker who is trying to help a teenage girl in East London to get a life for herself. There is a difficulty, however: ‘Her mother wants her to go on the game.’ My friend explained: ‘It’s the money, you know.’

An underclass has existed throughout history, which once endured appalling privation. Its spasmodic outbreaks of violence, especially in the early 19th century, frightened the ruling classes.

Its frustrations and passions were kept at bay by force and draconian legal sanctions, foremost among them capital punishment and transportation to the colonies.

Today, those at the bottom of society behave no better than their forebears, but the welfare state has relieved them from hunger and real want.

When social surveys speak of ‘deprivation’ and ‘poverty’, this is entirely relative. Meanwhile, sanctions for wrongdoing have largely vanished.

When Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith recently urged employers to take on more British workers and fewer migrants, he was greeted with a hoarse laugh.

Birmingham: People wearing masks swig alcohol next to a burning car in Birmingham city centre last night

Ken Livingstone, contemptible as ever, declares the riots to be a result of the Government’s spending cuts. This recalls the remarks of the then leader of Lambeth Council, ‘Red Ted’ Knight, who said after the 1981 Brixton riots that the police in his borough ‘amounted to an army of occupation’.

But it will not do for a moment to claim the rioters’ behaviour reflects deprived circumstances or police persecution.

Of course it is true that few have jobs, learn anything useful at school, live in decent homes, eat meals at regular hours or feel loyalty to anything beyond their local gang.

This is not, however, because they are victims of mistreatment or neglect.

It is because it is fantastically hard to help such people, young or old, without imposing a measure of compulsion which modern society finds unacceptable. These kids are what they are because nobody makes them be anything different or better.

Rampage: We are told that youths roaming the streets are doing so because they are angry at unemployment, but a quick looks at an apprenticeship website yields 2,228 vacancies in London

A key factor in delinquency is lack of effective sanctions to deter it. From an early stage, feral children discover that they can bully fellow pupils at school, shout abuse at people in the streets, urinate outside pubs, hurl litter from car windows, play car radios at deafening volumes, and, indeed, commit casual assaults with only a negligible prospect of facing rebuke, far less retribution.

John Stuart Mill wrote in his great 1859 essay On Liberty: ‘The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people.’

Yet every day up and down the land, this vital principle of civilised societies is breached with impunity.

Anyone who reproaches a child, far less an adult, for discarding rubbish, making a racket, committing vandalism or driving unsociably will receive in return a torrent of obscenities, if not violence.

So who is to blame? The breakdown of families, the pernicious promotion of single motherhood as a desirable state, the decline of domestic life so that even shared meals are a rarity, have all contributed importantly to the condition of the young underclass.

The social engineering industry unites to claim that the conventional template of family life is no longer valid.

Protection: Asian shopkeepers stand outside their store in Hackney that was battered by the looters. This time, though, they're ready to take them on

And what of the schools? I do not think they can be blamed for the creation of a grotesquely self-indulgent, non-judgmental culture.

This has ultimately been sanctioned by Parliament, which refuses to accept, for instance, that children are more likely to prosper with two parents than with one, and that the dependency culture is a tragedy for those who receive something for nothing.

The judiciary colludes with social services and infinitely ingenious lawyers to assert the primacy of the rights of the criminal and aggressor over those of law-abiding citizens, especially if a young offender is involved.

The police, in recent years, have developed a reputation for ignoring yobbery and bullying, or even for taking the yobs’ side against complainants.

‘The problem,’ said Bill Pitt, the former head of Manchester’s Nuisance Strategy Unit, ‘is that the law appears to be there to protect the rights of the perpetrator, and does not support the victim.’

Police regularly arrest householders who are deemed to have taken ‘disproportionate’ action to protect themselves and their property from burglars or intruders. The message goes out that criminals have little to fear from ‘the feds’.

Do rioters, pictured looting a shop in Hackney, have lower levels of a brain chemical that helps keep behaviour under control? Scientists think so

Figures published earlier this month show that a majority of ‘lesser’ crimes — which include burglary and car theft, and which cause acute distress to their victims — are never investigated, because forces think it so unlikely they will catch the perpetrators.

How do you inculcate values in a child whose only role model is footballer Wayne Rooney — a man who is bereft of the most meagre human graces?

How do you persuade children to renounce bad language when they hear little else from stars on the BBC?

A teacher, Francis Gilbert, wrote five years ago in his book Yob Nation: ‘The public feels it no longer has the right to interfere.’

Discussing the difficulties of imposing sanctions for mis-behaviour or idleness at school, he described the case of a girl pupil he scolded for missing all her homework deadlines.

The youngster’s mother, a social worker, telephoned him and said: ‘Threatening to throw my daughter off the A-level course because she hasn’t done some work is tantamount to psychological abuse, and there is legislation which prevents these sorts of threats.

‘I believe you are trying to harm my child’s mental well-being, and may well take steps . . . if you are not careful.’

That story rings horribly true. It reflects a society in which teachers have been deprived of their traditional right to arbitrate pupils’ behaviour. Denied power, most find it hard to sustain respect, never mind control.

Mob: A crowd of people rush into a fashion store in Peckham

I never enjoyed school, but, like most children until very recent times, did the work because I knew I would be punished if I did not. It would never have occurred to my parents not to uphold my teachers’ authority. This might have been unfair to some pupils, but it was the way schools functioned for centuries, until the advent of crazy ‘pupil rights’.

I recently received a letter from a teacher who worked in a county’s pupil referral unit, describing appalling difficulties in enforcing discipline. Her only weapon, she said, was the right to mark a disciplinary cross against a child’s name for misbehaviour.

Having repeatedly and vainly asked a 15-year-old to stop using obscene language, she said: ‘Fred, if you use language like that again, I’ll give you a cross.’

He replied: ‘Give me an effing cross, then!’ Eventually, she said: ‘Fred, you have three crosses now. You must miss your next break.’

He answered: ‘I’m not missing my break, I’m going for an effing fag!’ When she appealed to her manager, he said: ‘Well, the boy’s got a lot going on at home at the moment. Don’t be too hard on him.’

This is a story repeated daily in schools up and down the land.

Making a run for it: These four looters dash from the Blue Inc store in Peckham with looted goods

A century ago, no child would have dared to use obscene language in class. Today, some use little else. It symbolises their contempt for manners and decency, and is often a foretaste of delinquency.

If a child lacks sufficient respect to address authority figures politely, and faces no penalty for failing to do so, then other forms of abuse — of property and person — come naturally.

So there we have it: a large, amoral, brutalised sub-culture of young British people who lack education because they have no will to learn, and skills which might make them employable. They are too idle to accept work waitressing or doing domestic labour, which is why almost all such jobs are filled by immigrants.

They have no code of values to dissuade them from behaving anti-socially or, indeed, criminally, and small chance of being punished if they do so.

They have no sense of responsibility for themselves, far less towards others, and look to no future beyond the next meal, sexual encounter or TV football game.

Behind bins: Rioters in Hackney stand in front of a makeshift barricade

They are an absolute deadweight upon society, because they contribute nothing yet cost the taxpayer billions. Liberal opinion holds they are victims, because society has failed to provide them with opportunities to develop their potential.

Most of us would say this is nonsense. Rather, they are victims of a perverted social ethos, which elevates personal freedom to an absolute, and denies the underclass the discipline — tough love — which alone might enable some of its members to escape from the swamp of dependency in which they live.

Only education — together with politicians, judges, policemen and teachers with the courage to force feral humans to obey rules the rest of us have accepted all our lives — can provide a way forward and a way out for these people.

They are products of a culture which gives them so much unconditionally that they are let off learning how to become human beings. My dogs are better behaved and subscribe to a higher code of values than the young rioters of Tottenham, Hackney, Clapham and Birmingham.

Unless or until those who run Britain introduce incentives for decency and impose penalties for bestiality which are today entirely lacking, there will never be a shortage of young rioters and looters such as those of the past four nights, for whom their monstrous excesses were ‘a great fire, man’.Every firm in the land knows that an East European — for instance — will, first, bother to turn up; second, work harder; and third, be better-educated than his or her British counterpart.Who do we blame for this state of affairs?

A SPOILED GENERATION IS SPOILING OUR SOCIETY

2011-08-09T12:59:00.000-07:00

Dr Aric Sigman

We make no apology for reproducing this article almost two years after its original publication. In light of the frightening scenes we are witnessing in our major cities around the country, it seems most appropriate.

In a book published almost two years ago called "The Spoiled Generation" psychologist Dr Aric Sigman explored the erosion of discipline, respect and civility in the youth of the UK and the negaive effect it is having on society. We first posted an artcle about this in September 2009.

Dr Sigman accurately captured the growing sense of unease felt by a large percentage of the UK public. He said “Children of the spoilt generation are used to having their demands met by their parents and others in authority, and that in turn makes them unprepared for the realities of adult life. This has consequences in every area of society, from the classroom to the workplace, the streets to the criminal courts and rehabilitation clinics".

He suggested that children & young people’s rights must be curtailed and a firm hand is urgently needed if they are to be properly guided into adulthood.

Dr Sigman, a fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine, continued: “Authority is a basic health requirement in children’s lives. But, while children have become increasingly ‘empowered’ in terms of legislation and rights, far from being protected, they are actually suffering in ways that could never have been foreseen.”

The police see the consequences of the "Spoiled Generation" every day on the street of the UK. - A 44% rise in assaults on police by children is surely a symptom of a much greater disease that will follow if not treated fast.

Respect for law and order and authority is fading rapidly as parents and schools fail in their duty to their children. The criminal justice system including the police are then just one of the groups of agencies that deal with the fall out. The empowering of children, however well intended, has served to undermine the authority of parents, teachers, police officers and other authority figures.

If the Government are to start the task of fixing our society, then surely there is no better place to start than here. By instilling some firm handed forgotten disciplines within the "spoiled sector" of our youth, there will at least be a glimmer of hope that the UK may once again be a pleasant place to live.

HOW RIGHT Dr SIGMAN WAS TWO YEARS AGO.

His words were indeed a wise prohecy of what was to come and what we are witnessing is a direct result of the spoiled youth among our communities, lawless and totally lacking in respect.

What we are witnessing is the result of a society in complete decay as a result of a small minority of our community. I wish it were as simple as saying they have lost their moral compass. In fact the have not just lost it, they have smashed it to smithereens and now happily grind the broken pieces into the faces of the hard working, law abiding folk with their wanton, greedy criminal activity. We are in the midst of frightening times. The global economy is in ever greater danger, with billions of pounds wiped from the value of Britain’s top companies on a daily basis over the past week.
On the streets of London, mobs engaged in a third day of looting and arson, with the violence fast spreading across the capital and to other major cities.

What began in Tottenham has spawned an orgy of wanton greed where opportunistic thugs smash shop windows in broad daylight for a pair of designer trainers or a flat-screen TV.

Arrest figures indicate many of those involved are mere teenagers, who view looting as a game to be played out over the internet and Twitter. They have zero respect for the law or the livelihoods and homes they are destroying.

Sadly, for all the bravery of the officers sent out to confront these hooded mobs, the police face many worrying questions. Why, in the obviously tense aftermath of Mr Duggan’s shooting, were officers so unprepared and easily overwhelmed on the streets of Tottenham? Most disturbingly, just where were the police while buildings burned in London?

There can be no worse time for the Met to experienced the resignation of Scotland Yard’s two most senior officers over phone-hacking – a matter that history will record as piffling compared with the violence and criminality we are witnssing.

To her great credit, Home Secretary Theresa May immediately returned from her summer break to confront the crisis, but London Mayor Boris Johnson had to be dragged home late last night, with the damage to his reputation already done.

Meanwhile, the handwringing apologists on the Left relish the opportunity to try to blame the violence on poverty, social deprivation and a disaffected black youth. The ex-Labour Mayor Ken Livingstone risibly – and damnably – claimed ‘the economic stagnation and cuts being imposed by the Tory government’ were responsible – despite the fact the austerity programme has yet to begin in earnest.

Inevitably, the BBC is helping to peddle this myth – seeking out community leaders who blame a lack of youth clubs for the looting, and revelling in footage of Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg being harangued by residents blaming ‘Coalition cuts’.

To blame the cuts is immoral and cynical. This has nothing to do with cuts. This is criminality – pure and simple – by yobs who have nothing but contempt for decent, law-abiding people.

Regardless of the propaganda being spewed out by the Left-wingers, this is not a repeat of the political riots that scarred the early 1980s, which were sparked by mass unemployment and alleged police racism. If anything, it was Labour’s nurturing of a benefits culture, in which youngsters believe there is no need to work to have a comfortable lifestyle, which sowed the seeds of the riots – not any ‘Coalition cuts’.

Ministers must make sure there is an adequate police response to ensure the thugs responsible are properly detained and get the punishment they deserve. If David Cameron want to restore order, he must keep the niave and utterly stupid views of Ken Clarke out of public earshot.

A firm judicial hand is required now. Arrest those responsible. Get them before the courts quickly. There can be no molly coddling justice for these yobs. Prison, and a good long hard dose of it is the only result that will restore the confidence of the law abiding majority. Magistrates and Judges, after these events more than ever, MUST demonstrate that our justice system CAN work. Worry about reoffending rates after they've served the full sentences for these atrocities. Speak to an average member of the public. You will find their views mirror those of the police officers, police bloggers and their contributors. They are not interested in theories about whether jail works or not. All they want is to be protected from the threat they face at the hands of these yobs. They want to see robust effective policing. They want to see this sort of behaviour punished to the full extent of the sentence for the offence. They want to see the offenders having a hard time of it in jail, deprived of the comforts and benefits they currently enjoy.

The rest of us can only watch events and pray the savagery and criminality spreads no further and quite simply, that justice is done for us all and IS SEEN TO BE DONE!

AND FOR CRYING OUT LOUD, HEED THE WARNINGS OF ARIC SIGMAN AND HIS LIKE BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE.

On Police Chiefs: "Power does not corrupt men; fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power.".

2011-07-26T11:07:00.000-07:00

"40% detections, brilliant lad! Now off you go . . . "

"Power does not corrupt men; fools, however, if they get into a position of power, corrupt power."

- George Bernard Shaw

As yet another set of Home Office Crime Statistics are released, with more than a passing resemblance to a story from the brothers Grimm, those creative Home Office statisticians have appended another masterpiece of deceptional fiction in the form of the report entitled Crimes detected in England and Wales 2010/11.

Peter Fahy, Chief of GMP has denied police corruption is widespread – he is unconvinced corruption is a ‘major problem’. His comments might turn out a little premature now that the Prime Minister has ordered a review of all forces’ media relationships and in particular with News International.

It would be naive to believe that the extent of the problem is restricted solely to the Met. Chief Constables and senior officers up and down the country must be fearing who the spotlight will fall on next, many seriously considering if they should jump first and save their gold plated pensions before being pushed.

The morale of decent officers had been damaged by claims which have emerged during the scandal. However, it is not the decent, honest officers that need worry about the fall out from this saga, it is those who have acted inappropriately, even criminally.

So Mr Fahy is not convinced that corruption is a major problem?

What is the pernicious, deceitful manipulation of recorded crime and detections over a 20 year period, where Chief Officers knowingly accepted 10-15% performance bonuses related to fudged numbers if it isn’t corruption?

Similar views have been expressed many times by experienced and respected serving, former or retired police officers. Have a wander over to Bankside Babble, the author of which is a respected voice on the subject. Others worth a visit are our friends over at the Surrey Constabulary blog, Inspector Gadget, 200 weeks, All Copped Out, PC Bloggs, and others too numerous to mention, all of whom have scant regard for the integrity of the statistics they are forced to fudge.

I’m not talking of mass individual corruption here, but institutional corruption, in the formation and/or condoning of strategies that force lower ranks to compromise their integrity with fallacious crime reporting and detections? Worse, when the faeces strikes the oscillating mechanism, who will end up being held accountable? Certainly not the teflon coated ACPO ranks I’ll wager.

Police corruption comes in many guises, from accepting bribes to fabricating evidence in order to secure the conviction of a suspected criminal. Such a wide variety makes it difficult to formulate a definition which encapsulates all forms of the behaviour. Earlier studies tended to concentrate on the more obvious forms of illegal behaviour, which are adequately legislated for in criminal law:

“Police scandals are of three predominant varieties: corruption, such as accepting bribes; procedural abuse that perverts the course of justice; and the excessive use of force against suspects.” (Waddington 1999:121)

However such a definition does not extend to behaviours designed to give the impression of improved performance by perverse means. Such practices are referred to within the service as ‘fiddling the figures’, ‘massaging the books’ or more recently ‘good housekeeping’ (Chatterton 2008:46). In academic circles the phenomenon is referred to as ‘gaming’ and has recently been much associated with Performance Management Loveday (1994 & 1999),De Bruijn (2001 & 2007), Bevan & Hood (2006).

The evidence to suggest the involvement of senior officers in ‘gaming’ behaviour is not surprisingly limited. Kappeler et al (1994) noted that senior officers entered into an ‘unholy alliance’ with junior officers, tolerating illicit activities as long as they were effective while Diez (1995) suggested senior officers manipulated performance information to give a favourable impression of the organisation.

Chief Officers and SMT’s clearly take the view that probity comes at the cost of reduced performance. So, Chief Constables and some SMT’s have been fiddling the stats for donkeys years. However, most are cute enough to force the muck downhill, either saying they only encouraged ethical practices or they were simply ignorant of what’s been going on. In fact, all the evidence we have accumulated indicates the problem is more of an institutional nature than individual. Fudging crime statistics and detections for career and financial gain cannot be right. Peter Fahy says that corruption within the service is not endemic. Should the full story about crime be finally revealed, there will be many that will take the opposing view, particularly regarding the ACPO ranks who are ultimately responsible for the processes.

The facts remain:-

• Forces are fiddling TIC’s something rotten (still). Offenders serving custodial sentences admit 40+% of the burglary and vehicle offences detected this way. There is no come back as the system allows (with the authorisation of a Guvnor) the admissions without court attendance or any punitive measures. I thought this practice died years ago, but all they’ve done is adjusted the framework. In return for inducements, or a nice ride out from clink, scrotes will admit 1000 ‘s of offences, many of which they didn’t commit. Have a looks at oneof our colleagues posts at http://blog.old-and-bold.com/wordpress/?p=5470 to witness one of many examples we have on file illustrating the extent of the problem.

• False reporting strategies (well intended initially for false mobile phone theft reports) have been extended to all volume acquisitive crime in lots of forces, suppressing the crime levels dramatically.

• Abuse of cautions (20% of detections) Fixed penalties (7%), TIC’s (6%) and cannabis warnings (7%) is rife. The burden of proof principle seems to have been ignored in ’000′s of such instances, whereby cases that would never go the distance at court due to weak evidence, are all too often disposed of by these methods as an attractive alternative for the offender to avoid the court process. In such cases, abuse of discretionary powers results in poor policing practice.

• Cannabis warnings account for 7% of national detections. Whilst no fan of “whacky backy” ‘000’s of police man hours are consumed at the direction of SMT’s just to perpetuate the myth of 28% national detection averages. The same applies to the minor public order and threats offences, (playground & mobile phone threats etc). Literally ‘000’s of them driving up detection rates fallaciously and diverting officer attention away from the more serious, harder to resolve crimes.

• SMT’s up and down the country screen out ‘000’s of harder to detect crimes, in favour of the middle class “Quick Win” offences, what we used to call domestics that have been allowed to be upgraded to technical criminal matters. Teams of officers redeployed to tick boxes rather than acquire the investigative expertise to resolve crimes that matter most to the public.

• Forces discovered during HMIC Inspections to be keeping unofficial crime registers to keep the numbers down. (We knew them as occurrence books MK47). HMIC discovered forces using these for crimes that never hit the books.

• Forces abusing the incident reporting process, issuing incident numbers that never elevate to crime numbers.

• Re classifying burglaries as damage to dwellings/commercial properties (thousands of them!!)

• Re classifying vehicle offences downward so they appear in larger lesser offence groups.

• Re classifying robberies. No offender caught = no mens rea = lesser “other theft”

• Serious offences cautioned or PND issued

• HMIC have been particularly reluctant to open up on the subject, despite a number of force inspections revealing clear evidence of gaming activity, no senior officer has been brought to account. In 2007 HMIC carried out an audit of detections for the years 2005/6 and 2006/7 (Home Office Nov.2006 & 2007). The results of this audit were not made public, although Police Authorities were provided with a copy of the results on their own force only. This was a deviation from the policy of publication pursued by HMIC since 1991. However HMIC did subsequently publish a summary of the results on their web site in response to a request made under the provisions of the Freedom Of Information Act. The audit showed 33 out of 44 forces were graded ‘poor’ on non-sanctioned detections, made up in the main of informal warnings. This audit uncovered cases where offences had been recorded as detected without the suspects' and the victims' knowledge. We wre granted access to copy correspondence between ACPO and the IOC obtained lawfully by FOI requests. The extracts below are a contemporaneous record of what was contained in the correspondence. This Association of Police Officers wrote to the Information Commissioner to inform him of the breaches of the Data Protection Act stating:

“The nub of the issue faced by the service is that a proportion of the offences detected by non-sanction means fail the ‘administrative test’ in that they do not comply with HOCR.
The most frequent errors are:

• The sufficiency of evidence (this is a judgement issue with the HMIC and forces coming to a different view) to justify/support a non-sanctioned detection.

• A failure to record whether the victim has been informed that the offence has been detected through non-sanctioned means, and

• A failure to record that the suspect has been informed.”
(ACPO letter to the Information Commissioner 13.2.2007 unpublished)

The Information Commissioner articulates the crux of the matter in his response:

“From my perspective I am most concerned that individuals were not being informed that they were considered to be the perpetrator of an offence even though this did not involve a legal process, especially if such information could be used in future Enhanced Disclosure relating to them. This clearly breaches the requirement of the first data protection principle that the processing of personal data must be done fairly. I am also worried by the sufficiency of evidence used. If a police force is going to label an individual as the de facto perpetrator then they must have a good objective reason for doing so. Not having this could lead to a record being viewed as inadequate or inaccurate (breaches of the third and fourth principles respectively).”
(Information Commissioner 26.3.2007: Unpublished)

However, he declined to take any proactive action to alert the public:

“I would prefer to work with chief officers to ensure compliance. I would like to know more detail about how this has come about and what action is being taken to ensure future compliance” (Information Commissioner 26.3.2007: Unpublished)

Further correspondence from ACPO dated 10.4.2007 provided further assurances:

“Please rest assured that the issues that have come to light as a result of the recent Association of Chief Police Officers’ and HMIC audits have been taken extremely seriously by the police service. To this end a series of meetings have taken place in fast time with all relevant parties, including the Home Office, to consider how best to address the concerns that you raised to which we are alive”
(ACPO letter to the Information Commissioner 10.4.2007: Unpublished)

This correspondence demonstrates that ACPO, together with HMIC, their principal regulator, and the Home Office, to whom they are politically accountable, as well as the Information Commissioner, decided to deal with a major failing without making the public aware of the nature or scale of the issue. However ACPO were particularly vague on the nature and scale of the problem:

“ACPO has reviewed a snapshot of disclosures for the period 2003 – 2005 (for a range of ‘high risk’ offences). Whilst the process has (but for a handful of cases) worked effectively.” (ACPO letter to the Information Commissioner 13.2.2007 unpublished)

ALL IN ALL, ONE ALMIGHTY FUDGE BY THE REGULATORY AUTHORITIES, WHO SEEM TO BE “RUNNING SCARED” AT THE POTENTIAL CONSEQUENCES OF OPENING THIS CAN OF WORMS.

• Bear in mind that over the 15-20 or so years that the numbers have been fiddled so astronomically, there were Chiefs and SMT’s receiving between 10-15% of their £100k basic as bonus for successful performance management. So, in short, manipulate the numbers disgracefully and perniciously beyond recognition, satisfy the police authority targets were met, get paid thousands as a bonus for hitting targets! As previous articles on this site reflects, if this isn’t corruption in public office, we would have to ask "what is???".

• Much of this information was passed onto the National Statistician (Jil Matthieson) after she was commissioned by Theresa May to review crime statistics and detections. Whilst pleased to get a mention in the acknowledgements of her report (under the company name), she too has thus far failed to take the bull by the horns. When push came to shove, all she proposed was that the presentation of the data should be independently processed through her office. It remains to be seen whether she will have the courage for the job.

• In view of the fact that a considerable number of high powered police chiefs may turn out to be implicated in doubtful practices, it may well be that other means to bring the information to the surface may need to be considered.

All in all, a real can of worms. My greatest concern for the service (a view shared with Federation Chairman Paul McKeever) is that this fallacious picture of success on reducing crime and increasing detections, played its part in the inclusion of policing in the comprehensive spending review. Which minister in his/her right mind would have authorised cuts with rising crime and downward spiralling detections? The allocation of funding is partly arrived at through assessment of performance criteria. So, the conclusion we must draw from this, is that the deceptive practices have come back to bite the backsides of the Chief Officers that introduced or at the very least condoned them. “Authors of their own misfortune” springs to mind.

The fact remains that there is plenty of evidence to indicate that the crime statistics and detections scandal pales the MP expenses saga into relative insignificance. I would not wish to see any unnecessary obstructions placed in the path of honourable, honest policing. However, unless and until this mess is exposed fully, public confidence cannot be expected. I have little or no confidence that MP’s of any colour would have the courage or motivation required to take this forward.

Finally, I would commend anyone interested in the truth about police detections to read a report commissioned by the Joint Central Committee (JCC) of the Police Federation of England and Wales. The JCC, having become increasingly concerned by a barrage of reports it was receiving from the Detectives' Forum and Joint Branch Boards around the country that the resilience of General Office CID was being severely diminished and that there was a debilitating shortage of trained and experienced detectives. The reported
consequence was that some serious crime was not being properly investigated and
detected.

The JCC therefore commissioned Dr Michael Chatterton to conduct an independent study into General Office CID to examine the issues of resilience, workload and training and to identify the consequences.

Mike Chattertons commissioned report is attached, which is well worth a read. I refer to it frequently in my reports and on the site as it contains substantial evidential content from rank and file officers and SMT’s alike, none of which contradicts the views mentioned here.

Chatterton opens the report by identifying the detrimental effects of the sanctions detection regime and the excessively rigid and bureaucratic approach to targets and performance management. A combination of these is having a pernicious and perverse effect on police operations.

• diverting police priorities from serious crime to chasing minor offences;
• criminalising members of the public who are not criminals in the accepted sense;
• giving the public a false sense of security that serious crime is being detected with increasing effectiveness by the police;
and
• undermining the discretion necessary for the impartial discharge of the office of constable.

To quote Mike Chatterton … “There is no change in Government and senior police management policy which is at once more urgent and important than this”.

"Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies come true".
Eric Hoffer (1902-1983) American philosopher and author

IF POWER CORRUPTS AND ABSOLUTE POWER CORRUPTS ABSOLUTELY, WHO THE HELL CAN WE TRUST?

2011-07-16T07:02:00.000-07:00

As readers of these pages will know, the main topics of my articles centre around policing and the criminal justice system.

However, applying the principle of "cause and effect", it is clear that the problems that exist within our society today do not rest entirely with the police or the judiciary. When looking for causes, the problems and challenges our communities face are both "bottom up" and top down".

The root cause of many of our problems actually starts with the corrupt practices prevalent within hieracrch of the sectors that influence our lives most, politics, banking education, health, media and yes the criminal justice arena.

"Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition" Thomas Jefferson.

Venality Definition: "Prostitution of talents or offices or services for reward. The condition of being susceptible to bribery or corruption. The use of a position of trust for dishonest gain".

In an excellent recent article, Max Hastings tells it as it is. To read the article at source click here, or read on below.

Our great institutions are becoming tainted by venality and incompetence.

Where are leaders of integrity when we need them?

The resignation of Rebekah Brooks as chief executive of Rupert Murdoch’s News International represents a new eruption in the phone-hacking scandal that has damaged the media, police and the Cameron government.

Not impressed with "Curruption UK"

Yet this is only the latest in a long series of blows that have struck almost every major national institution in Britain in recent years: the bank bosses were exposed in 2008 as greedy incompetents, and both Houses of Parliament were rocked last year by revelations of systemic expenses fraud.

The British have always liked to see people at the head of their society to whom they could look upwards with a little respect, and I do not mean footballers or TV celebrities.

Yet today we find ourselves searching almost despairingly for leaders in politics, in the Church, in the professions, in corporate business and in public service who seem deserving of trust.

The historian G.M. Young asserted complacently in the 1930s that ‘the four most efficient institutions in England are the police, railways, trade unions and joint stock banks — all founded 100 years ago by the same Conservative government’. Not only would Young find it hard to applaud any of those bodies today, but he would struggle to find any national institution that looks untarnished.

When the dust settles from the phone-hacking row, the most serious reputational damage will almost certainly prove to have been sustained by the police. The public is justly cynical about Britain’s media underworld. People may be disgusted by the revelations of the past fortnight, but I doubt they are shocked.

The police, however, are a different kettle of fish. We need to believe that Britain’s law enforcers are honest and efficient. Yet this saga deals a body-blow to any such presumptions.

Whatever the findings of the judicial inquiry into phone-hacking and bribery, we can already see that some of Britain’s most senior officers had close and almost certainly improper relations with News International.

Some of us, including successive Home Secretaries, have believed for decades that the police culture is rotten.

An intelligence official told me recently how shocked he was by systemic and malicious police leaks about an important case in which the Secret Intelligence Service was involved.

The police record as catchers of criminals is patchy, to say the least. Yet their bosses close ranks to deny any shortcomings — except, of course, in their financial resourcing — and fight reform tooth and nail.

Some years ago, speaking at a conference of the Association of Chief Police Officers, I suggested that the breakdown of the traditional alliance between the police and the middle class was a tragedy.

When I sat down, a succession of angry chief constables rose to rubbish my remarks. A senior BBC executive with whom I had shared the platform observed afterwards he could not decide whether I had been brave or foolish. But almost everything I said would be taken for granted by any ordinary citizen.

The police will never regain our trust until they get decent leadership and smash the so-called ‘canteen culture’ that pervades the force. Now, surely, the game is up. The decent officers, of whom there are many, deserve much better than they have got, and so does the British public.

Radical change must be forced on the police, for their sakes as well as ours. Because I am a historian, I hesitate before damning the current membership of the House of Commons because it is easy to catalogue shockers from the past.

Consider, for instance, a survey of MPs between 1790 and 1820: among 658 Members, 50 acknowledged having fathered illegitimate children; 220 were financially ruined and 35 died in exile abroad in consequence; five were expelled for fraud; and at least 19 committed suicide, while six went mad.

By that standard, today’s MPs are no worse than many of their predecessors.

But many people are deeply dismayed by the manner in which all the political parties and indeed this Government are dominated by people who have never done anything. That is to say, they have never held proper jobs, or served in the Armed Forces, or learned how businesses are run.

Few have ever been tested in the fires of conflict or even commerce. Their whole adult and even adolescent lives have been devoted to politics, unlike the Denis Healeys and Michael Heseltines, the Ernie Bevins and Willie Whitelaws of former generations.

They have exhaustively studied polls and focus groups, TV interviewing techniques and speech-writing, but they know next to nothing about what most of us would call real life. Moreover, ministers no longer have top-flight officials to cover for them: there has been a grave decline in the Civil Service.

Much as we love to mock Sir Humphrey Appleby, the devious under-secretary in Yes, Minister, he was jolly clever. So too were some of his real-life counterparts, men such as Sir Frank Cooper and Sir Michael Quinlan at the Ministry of Defence in the Eighties.

Do the police need a top down clean up?

Old Whitehall mandarins might frustrate ministers by running rings around them, but they had the brains to save them from their mistakes and keep the machine running.

I remember Quinlan sighing to me about the Ministry of Defence when diarist, serial adulterer and career scoundrel Alan Clark was a minister: ‘We’ve only got one politician here with any brains — and he’s mad.’

But most of today’s senior Whitehall officials are nothing like as bright as Quinlan and other big figures of past generations. A headmaster of Eton remarked a few years ago that, when he first went to the school, every autumn a handful of the best leavers joined the Home Civil Service.

Not any more. Nowadays, if they want fun they join the media; if they crave money they head for the City. In David Cameron’s shoes, I would recognise a priority to get better people into the top Whitehall jobs if he is to have any hope of getting anything done.

Revitalising the upper reaches of the Civil Service could do more than almost anything else to make us a better-governed country.

As for our religious leaders, we should acknowledge that the Church of England has always been an object of mockery.

A century- and-a-half ago, Anthony Trollope found plenty to laugh at, in his great tales of the clerical world of Barsetshire. Does anybody remember the Seventies TV comedy series All Gas And Gaiters?

But until recent times, the teasing was affectionate. Decent local vicars, of whom there were many, commanded the regard and gratitude of their communities.

Yet in the space of a generation, respect for the C of E has almost evaporated. It is racked by rows about gay and women priests. Nobody any more sings Onward Christian Soldiers, which we all used to love belting out, because prelates are terrified it might suggest enthusiasm for the war in Afghanistan.

Fewer people regularly attend Britain’s churches than Britain’s mosques.

Gaffe Prone Dr Williams

The tenure as Archbishop of Canterbury of that absurd druid Rowan Williams has been embarrassing: he cannot open his mouth without inserting a ski boot in it. Most recently, he questioned the democratic legitimacy of the Coalition, claiming that ‘no one’ had voted for its flagship policies to reform welfare, health and education, which he said were causing ‘anxiety and anger’.

What most of us look for in a spiritual leader is wisdom. In Williams, instead, we see ineffable silliness. The C of E has lost its dignity, without discovering a role.

Britain’s judiciary is still full of clever people, but its reputation has been severely damaged by its assumption of powers that most citizens think far beyond its rightful competence, and often insulting to common sense.

Court decisions, often deriving from judges’ personal interpretation of the doom-laden human rights laws, make effective immigration control almost impossible, leave terrorist sympathisers at large in the community, and make Britain the world’s haven for both foreign benefits claimants and Islamic militants.

Respect for the medical and teaching professions has ebbed. NHS GPs now earn six-figure incomes for doing less work than ten years ago, but still they have their hands out for more.

After asking a local doctor to counter-sign an official form for me recently, I was amazed to receive a bill for £25 for doing so. I responded that the practice could sue for the money if it chose, then changed GPs. The demand reflected an attitude of mind wholly alien to that of service to the community.

As for teachers, I feel less cross with them for striking in protest about their pension changes than for refusing to teach our children what they need to learn to survive in the 21st century, and for their bitter resistance to reform.

The entire profession remains in denial about the debasement of exam results and university degrees. Where once the local teacher in a street or village was a figure to admire, today teacher training colleges turn out jobsworths clinging to Leftist ideologies even a Cuban might think outdated.

Not much more need be said about bankers, save that their armour of greed and complacency remains proof against shame or social pressure to change their ways.

Chancellor George Osborne and Bank of England Governor Mervyn King are bent upon reforming British banking. But, tragically, the Americans refuse to move in step.

Meanwhile, the British Army and the monarchy remain almost the only national institutions that still command solid regard, the latter chiefly because of the personal conduct of the Queen and Prince Philip. I doubt whether either has accepted an unsuitable ‘freebie’ in their lives. They simply know how to behave — as too many of their family do not.

The Prince of Wales seems increasingly detached from planet Earth. Yet he’s determined to impose his highly controversial views on the nation — and its government — and in a constitutionally ill-judged, if not improper, fashion.

Prince Andrew’s dalliances with foreign dictators and gangsters seem repugnant, while Prince Edward’s recent appearances in military uniform have made him seem ridiculous to the British Armed Forces from whom he once fled.

Many of us tremble for the monarchy’s prospects when the Queen goes — as, with luck, she will not for many years yet — unless Prince William and his new bride can revive the ethic of discipline and discretion which his grandmother has wonderfully sustained.

To preserve the crown, the Royal Family as a whole need to behave with grace, avoid unsuitable company and keep their mouths shut. Only if their advisers can reconcile them to these three things will this vital institution be secure.

There seems a common strand in the decline of respect for almost all the others: so ubiquitous has become the worship of money, and those who make most of it, that the old ideal of public service is close to collapse.

In former times, many good and clever people made a conscious choice to adopt careers in which they would not earn a fortune, but where they felt they could make a worthwhile contribution and enjoy the regard of society.

In other words, they made sacrifices in order to serve. This was true of parsons, doctors, teachers, civil servants, service officers and indeed MPs.

Yet not long ago, I was dismayed when a brilliantly clever middle-aged teacher at a great school said to me ruefully: ‘My pupils assume I do this job because I couldn’t find anything that paid better.’

We have conditioned ourselves to a grotesquely exaggerated respect for wealth, and those who achieve it.

Britain’s public services and institutions were for centuries the envy of the world, not least because they were untarnished by the corruption endemic in the U.S., much of Europe and, of course, most of Africa and Asia.

I do not suggest that today Britain has become a very corrupt place: the rest of the world laughs at how cheaply one can buy a few British MPs and government officials. But the recent flood of scandals represents a wake-up call.

The public must feel assured that public servants, from Downing Street to the humblest beat copper, are working to serve the interests of the State, rather than being in it for what they themselves can make out of it.

The people who run and influence our society need to preserve their dignity and command our respect. Too many have recently done too much that diminishes these qualities. We shall all be the poorer if we cannot win them back.

Ends . . . .

A FINAL NOTE ON CORRUPTION . . . . . . .

I can't think why an article on corruption should link so naturally to the release of the latest crime figures, but it does! (I like the word veniality better than corruption, thinking of senior police chiefs prostituting themselves seems highly amusing and appropriate).

The latest work of fantasy from the Home Office Crime In England & Wales 2010/11 can be reached by clicking the link.

This year, the Home Office madarins thought detections deserved a seperate publication, such is the wealth of fantasy contained within the document, it is deserving of a place alongside messrs Grimm and Hans Christian Anderson on bookshelves everywhere. The detections publication can be read here.

For those of you with a particular interest in the numbers, (or in need of a cure for insomnia) the data files can be downloaded by starting here, and clicking the links for what interests you.

Now that the crime fgures are finally released, and having had the opportunity to examine the bulk of the documents and datasets, very little has changed. Recorded crime is still being wickedly suppressed and detections perniciously and fallcaiously exaggerated. Strong stuff you might think . . . Our latest analysis of crime and detections has taken many months to complete and exposes the facts behind the "Cooking of the crime and detection books". The arrival of this final piece of fiction from the Home Office will enable us to complete and publish the report on this site over the net few weeks.

CONTEMPT OF COPS - THE THIN END OF THE WEDGE.

2011-06-26T11:40:00.000-07:00

Apparently, Scotland Yard has issued guidance to Officers instructing them not to arrest people who verbally abuse them in the streets, as the courts don’t convict them and the force may have to pay out compensation claims.

Reported in the Mail and the Telegraph today, Scotland Yard has issued a card to its officers, telling them to do nothing if they are subjected to a torrent of obscene abuse.

The card, which the police are told to keep on them, secreted behind their warrant badges, says: ‘The courts do not accept police officers are caused harassment, alarm or distress by words such as ‘f**k, c**t, b*****ks, w*****s’.

For the non legal reader, the common legislation applied falls under section 5 of the Public Order Act, which states that a person is guilty of an offence under the act who:-

There must be a person within the sight or hearing of the suspect who is likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress by the conduct in question. A police officer may be such a person, but this is a question of fact to be decided in each case by the magistrates. In determining this, the magistrates may take into account the familiarity which police officers have with the words and conduct typically seen in incidents of disorderly conduct. (DPP v Orum [1988] Crim LR 848).http://www.parliament.uk/briefingpapers/commons/lib/research/briefings/SNHA-05760.pdf

Although the existence of a person who is caused harassment alarm and distress must be proved, there is no requirement that they actually give evidence. In appropriate cases, the offence may be proved on a police officer's evidence alone.

Police officers are aware of the difficult balance to be struck in dealing with those whose behaviour may be perceived by some as exuberant high spirits but by others as disorderly. In such cases informal methods of disposal may be appropriate and effective; but if this approach fails and the disorderly conduct continues then criminal proceedings may be necessary.

Whether behaviour can be properly categorised as disorderly is a question of fact. Disorderly behaviour does not require any element of violence, actual or threatened, and it includes conduct that is not necessarily threatening, abusive or insulting. It is not necessary to prove any feeling of insecurity in an apprehensive sense on the part of the member of the public (Chambers and Edwards v DPP [1995] Crim LR 896). The following types of conduct are examples, which may at least be capable of amounting to disorderly behaviour:

causing a disturbance in a residential area or common part of a block of flats;
persistently shouting abuse or obscenities at passers-by;
perstering people waiting to catch public transport or otherwise waiting in a queue;
rowdy behaviour in a street late at night which might alarm residents or passers-by, especially those who may be vulnerable, such as the elderly or members of an ethnic monority group;
causing a disturbance in a shopping precinct or other area to which the public have access or might otherwise gather;
bullying.

The Civil Actions Unit is a secretive body within the Metropolitan Police Authority, which handles legal claims brought against Scotland Yard.

More than 200 actions against the Met are settled every year – usually discreetly to avoid attracting negative publicity for the force – involving claims such as wrongful arrest, assault or discrimination. The unit is part of a chain of command headed by a detective chief superintendent who decides whether to defend an action or settle, and provides summaries of ongoing cases to the Metropolitan Police Authority on a weekly basis.

THANKFULLY, THE VAST MAJORITY OF RANK AND FILE POLICE OFFICERS ARE ENDOWED WITH MORE COMMON SENSE THAN THE TOTALLY RISK AVERSE CIVILA ACTIONS UNIT.

Here are a few examples of how common sense coppers responded to these headlines.

Inspector Gadget

"We totally ignore all this nonsense when it arrives in our inboxes, on plastic cards or those wretched e-learning packages. Senior Management know this, but they issue the instruction anyway to show they have ‘done something’ if the wheels come off later.

We know the law allows us to arrest abusive yobs and we know we have the legal power to use handcuffs if we think it is necessary. If any officer on my team is reluctant to stand firm in the face of the withering, violent and foul abuse we suffer every day from the public, I send them to CID. It’s that simple. The other officers on the team expect me to protect them by only allowing membership to those who can cope.

If police officers stopped arresting for offences simply on the basis that the Courts are failing to do anything about it once the defendant arrives there, we wouldn’t nick anyone for anything. We know the law, we know our powers of arrest and we understand who is a threat and who is not. Sometimes officers get it wrong, but we have tens of thousands of these kinds of interactions every day and almost all of them are dealt with satisfactorily".

And a few more . . .

What's next it's ok to assualt officers
Section 5 is so last summer
C**t is no longer a fou letterword
What a load of blks

THE THIN END OF THE WEDGE

"The thin end of the wedge is something small and seemingly unimportant that will lead to something much bigger and more serious".

Were it not for the common sense application of the law by rank and file officers, (many using Common Law Breach of The Peace powers to support their Section 5 arrests), the risk averse senior officers and departments within the service would render the working copper powerless, left only to tick boxes like their seniors. Thankfully, there are many committed officers who think like Inspector Gadget.

One of the earliest artcles from these pages looked at "The Spoiled Generation" where psychologist Dr Aric Sigman explored the erosion of discipline, respect and civility in the youth of the UK and the negaive effect it is having on society. He suggests that children & young people’s rights must be curtailed and a firm hand is urgently needed if they are to be properly guided into adulthood.

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.com/2009/09/spoiled-younger-generation-is-spoiling.html

Dr Sigman accurately captures the growing sense of unease felt by a large percentage of the UK public. He said “Children of the spoilt generation are used to having their demands met by their parents and others in authority, and that in turn makes them unprepared for the realities of adult life. This has consequences in every area of society, from the classroom to the workplace, the streets to the criminal courts and rehabilitation clinics".

The police see the consequences of the "Spoiled Generation" every day on the streets of the UK. Britain now has the highest rates of child depression, child-on-child murder, underage pregnancy, obesity, violent and anti-social behaviour and pre-teen alcoholism since records began. A 44% rise in assaults on police by children is surely a symptom of a much greater disease that will follow if not treated fast.

Respect for law and order and authority is fading rapidly as parents and schools fail in their duty to their children. The criminal justice system including the police are then just one of the groups of agencies that deal with the fall out. The empowering of children, however well intended, has served to undermine the authority of parents, teachers, police officers and other authority figures.

If the Government are to start the task of fixing our society, then surely there is no better place to start than here. By instilling some firm handed forgotten disciplines within the "spoiled sector" of our youth, there will at least be a glimmer of hope that the UK may once again be a pleasant place to live.

If it is down to politicians to start the ball rolling, we'll not hold our breath.

Plan to halve jail terms for guilty pleas scrapped

2011-06-21T00:05:00.000-07:00

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/8587607/Plan-to-halve-jail-terms-for-guilty-pleas-scrapped.html

David Cameron has ordered Kenneth Clarke to scrap plans to let criminals who plead guilty have their sentences halved.

By Andrew Porter, and Tom Whitehead

The Prime Minister will announce the move today at a news conference as he attempts to regain the Tories’ reputation for being tough on law and order.

Mr Clarke, the Justice Secretary, caused controversy by disclosing last month that all criminals, including rapists, would be eligible for a possible 50 per cent sentence discount for an early guilty plea.

After crisis talks with Mr Cameron, rapists were excluded from the plan. But after a weekend of wrangling, Mr Cameron will announce that no convicted criminal will be able to get their sentences halved in this way.

Under Labour there was the option of the sentence being cut by a third for a guilty plea. That is likely to stay in place as the revised sentencing Bill is unveiled.

But it raises questions about how the Ministry of Justice will raise the £120 million savings it has promised the Treasury. (Thin Blue Line comment: 11,500 foreign nationals serving custodial sentences costing the taxpayer £35,000 each. Deport 3,429 of them and save the £120 million.... simples).

It is also understood that Mr Cameron will include plans in the Bill for a mandatory jail term for some knife offenders. Those guilty of aggravated assault with a knife will get at least six months in jail.

As leader of the Opposition, Mr Cameron set out a plan which would see a presumption of an automatic jail term for anyone convicted of a knife offence.

Under today’s plans, thousands of violent foreign criminals will escape prosecution if they promise to return home.

Migrant offenders guilty of assault, including those who attack police officers, will be offered a conditional caution so long as they leave the country. It means they will avoid the courts and the risk of a prison term with effectively little more than a “slap on the wrist”. They could still be able to apply to return to Britain after two years.

Foreign fraudsters, thieves and those caught with cocaine or heroin will also be eligible for a conditional caution under the plans. The Bill will also contain plans to remove legal aid from squatters fighting eviction while immigrants appealing against refused visa renewals will no longer be publicly funded.

The Justice Bill will allow prosecutors to hand out conditional cautions to foreign offenders for offences including assault, assault on a police officer, possession of any drug, fraud, theft, handling stolen goods and stealing a car.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2011/jun/20/ken-clarke-abandon-sentence-cuts

Ken Clarke forced to abandon 50% sentence cuts for guilty pleas

Outcry from Tory right and tabloid press leads to scrapping of plan despite support from Lib Dems

Patrick Wintour, Allegra Stratton and Alan Travis

The Guardian, Tuesday 21 June 2011

David Cameron has forced Kenneth Clarke to abandon all plans for 50% sentence discounts for early guilty pleas, after an outcry on the Tory right and in the tabloids.

Cameron will announce the change at a Downing Street press conference on Tuesday, when the Ministry of Justice publishes its justice bill containing proposals for tougher community sentences and the introduction of a payment-by-results system to reduce prisoner reoffending.

After an outcry, Cameron forced Clarke to withdraw plans for the discount for rapists. There had been speculation that Clarke would manage to keep 50% discounts for some lesser offences, but the justice secretary has lost that battle.

Cameron has decided that any reduction in sentences in return for early guilty pleas would undermine his broader commitment to bring sense to sentencing.

The current discount is a third, and an extension to 50% would have meant a big drop in the prison population. The decision will mean the Ministry of Justice has to find as much as £100m in extra savings over four years from elsewhere in its budget. Most will come from a further squeeze on probation.

The Treasury has said it is willing to see the justice ministry change the speed at which it finds savings. No official confirmation was available from Downing Street before a meeting of the cabinet on Tuesday and Cameron's press conference.

Number 10 argues that trust in the criminal justice system is so low that it would be unable to sell a cut in sentences in return for early guilty pleas. Cameron's advisers have told him his party is losing its grip on the law and order agenda.

The Liberal Democrat leadership, which had promised to side with Clarke, appeared to have accepted defeat. A Lib Dem source said the 50% discount was not a party policy: "We never said we would want to bring it in. We are not totally wedded to it, and it is not a big loss."

Clarke's original green paper proposal was expected to produce savings of £210m a year by reducing the demand for prison places by 6,000. Ministry of Justice officials estimated that this would cut the record 85,000 prison population in England and Wales by 3,000 by the time of the next general election.

Other proposals expected on Tuesday include removing the courts' option of remanding in custody defendants who are unlikely to receive a prison sentence. This would save 1,300 prison places a year. Other proposals include deporting more foreign prisoners (500 places), a new release test for those serving indeterminate sentences for public protection (300 to 600 places), and diverting mentally ill prisoners into community health treatment services (650 prison places).

Helen Goodman, the shadow justice minister, said: "Ken Clarke's plan is to send fewer people to prison and to put more people on community sentences. This cannot work when probation trusts are taking the lion's share of the Ministry of Justice's cuts. These cuts will mean that there will be fewer probation officers monitoring fewer offenders less often."

Shadow justice secretary Sadiq Khan said: "From frontline policing to sentencing, we have seen promises on law and order broken by this government, which has severely damaged public trust in the justice system." He added that when it came to protecting the public, punishing and reforming offenders, supporting victims and cutting crime, he feared that the government would "fail on every count".

The justice minister, Crispin Blunt, gave a broad hint last week that any need to find further savings in the Ministry of Justice budget as a result of changes to the sentencing package were likely to come from the courts and probation services.

Blunt told MPs that probation had so far been "quite significantly protected" from his department's 23% budget cuts.

The plans have provoked fierce opposition, particularly from the solicitors' organisation, the Law Society.
One initial recommendation was to withdraw legal aid in family cases, except those involving allegations of domestic violence. Critics warned that this would provide a perverse incentive to exaggerate grievances.
Des Hudson, the Law Society chief executive, said he feared that cuts to legal aid could be even deeper than the proposed £350m because less money may be saved by keeping people out of prison.

He said: "This means they will come to the budget with sharpened pencils. We will not stand by and see the most vulnerable left with no access to justice."

Comments

"The man is a fossil who is totally out of touch with both reality and the standards of the people who voted for him Camera on should sack him without delay and get someone who isn't suffering from senile dementia to do the job, that in itself is going to be a problem".

"Plan to halve jail terms for guilty pleas scrapped - Might this have something to do with it being a cr*p idea to start with?"

"Recent evidence on Radio 4 showed criminals who are put away on short sentences quickly reoffend - short sentences don't act as a deterrent".

"Why did Ken "I'm a seasoned politician therefore I know everything" Clarke ever think the public would be happy with such a stupid idea?"

1. End the release after serving half of a sentence for good behaviour, and replace it with an increase in sentence for bad behaviour. Additionally, stop giving one third discounts for guilty pleas where the evidence against the person is overwhelming anyway.
2. Make them work. The should pay for their own keep. If they don't work they don't eat.
3. Get mobile phone signal blockers to stop them using smuggled in mobile phones. One of the easiest problems to solve.
4. Root out drugs

"We should stop trying to do justice on the cheap. Employ enough well trained prison guards to keep a system of discipline and pay them well. Stop turning a blind eye in order to pacify criminals. Make prison an unpleasant, strictly controlled environment into which no prisoner will want to return".

"There is NO justice in letting criminals off with any percentage of their sentence.
How long do they think the public and the police will put up with this kind of nonsense?
Why would any police officer put their life at risk when the criminal gets off?
Why would the public not take matters into their own hands when the criminal gets off?"

"Is Clarke the 'Justice' minister or just out to save money? Criminals free on the streets COST US BILLIONS and we'll pay for it either in personal attacks/murder/stolen property/insurance/fearing to participate in normal daily life or through taxes to keep these creeps where they belong - in jail".

"Well done, Prime Minister".

"How stupid can you get - "if they promise to return home." Home is now Britain! Sure I'd take the bus to Tooting, or Southall, or even to Rochdale. If you want me to go further, like Algeria, Jamaica, or Rumania, then I'll need a lot of 'bus fare'. But, I'll be back, British benefits are too, too, good".

"NO DISCOUNTS OF ANY KIND - PRISON WORKS FOR THE LAW ABIDING!"