Why are only satirists asking the obvious question?

From Newsthump:

Met Police Chief Cressida Dick... told reporters, “The Met Police do not like to admit defeat in solving crimes, but in this case, we’ve had too little to go on, so we have had no choice to look for outside help.

“There are so few clues that we just don’t know where to start. Whether it’s with the repeated public admissions of guilt from politicians and civil servants, the questioning of those who resigned over the breaches or to start by talking to the eye witnesses who just happen to be policemen who work for us. How is anyone supposed to solve a crime like this?"

From The Daily Mash:

The investigation into a number of thoroughly documented illegal gatherings that attendees are on record as attending is not expected to be challenging, especially once direct testimony is taken from the police officers who saw it all.

Nathan Muir of Hebden Bridge said: “Call me Columbo, but I’d begin there. Check the records, find out who was on duty, haul them to the interrogation room and get a full list of all parties they saw, heard or inadvertently attended. It doesn’t have to be Line of Duty. They’ll probably just tell you.

“They’ll definitely have noticed wheeled suitcases full of wine, because they’re sharp-eyed police, and there’ll definitely be full records of who was where when because it’s the seat of government."

I'd love to know which side is lying.

From the BBC:

The police statement said that at about 13:25 BST on Saturday officers from the Territorial Support Group "witnessed a vehicle with blacked-out windows that was driving suspiciously, including driving on the wrong side of the road. They indicated for it to stop but it failed to do so and made off at speed. The officers caught up with the vehicle when it stopped on Lanhill Road. The driver initially refused to get out of the car."

After searching Williams and Dos Santos, and the vehicle, nothing was found and no arrests were made. The incident was first raised on social media by their coach, 1992 Olympic 100m champion Linford Christie, who accused the police of abusing their power and institutionalised racism.

Williams, the fifth-fastest British woman in history over 200m, and Dos Santos said that a written report given to them by police did not mention driving on the wrong side of the road, and that where they stopped is a single car-width road.

Inconsistency 1

Williams and Dos Santos say they were stopped because they are POC. I have no doubt that this happens more often than it should, but you can't work backwards and say that every time a POC is stopped, it's because of institutional racism. White people get stopped as well.

The police say that the car's windows are blacked out. If true, the police wouldn't be able to tell what the people in the car look like, which rules out institutional racism as a reason for stopping them. But we know that the police sometimes twist things to cover their own arses.

Inconsistency 2

Dos Santos emphasises that the road on which they actually stopped is single car width. This appears to be undisputed.

However, that is not the question. The question is, how wide is the road on which they were initially flagged down and on which they didn't stop?

Driving for the sake of driving is apparently not an "essential journey"

The lock down rules have the aim of reducing person-to-person contact as far as possible.

Misguided or not, that's a clear enough basic principle.

So no more going on holiday by 'plane or train (fair enough); work from home if possible (fair enough); try and cut down on your shopping trips (one big shop a week instead of popping out for what you need - fair enough); no driving to beauty spots for a walk or picnic (too many other people there - fair enough). They classify this as "non-essential travel".

There is no earthly logic that says simply driving round in a circle for the joy of it goes against the basic principle (especially on empty roads with petrol at 102.9/litre). You get out of the house - with significant benefits for your mental health (doesn't mental health count as 'health reasons'? The alternative is hitting the booze much earlier in the day) - and you come into contact with precisely nobody.

In terms of person-to-person contact, driving is better and safer than going cycling or walking (which people still do in groups). Driving to your holiday home does not increase the number of person-to-person contacts so does not go against the basic principle either. But if you are employed by killjoys and banstubators, you have to toe the line I suppose.

A copper at a roadblock in the middle of Epping Forest yesterday informed me in no uncertain terms that joy riding is "non-essential" and therefore basically against the law - which they just made up on the spot. The logic is arse-backwards. Even more galling was the fact that said copper was standing well within two metres of me; and the road block was near a car park full of people going for walks or cycling.

There aren't expletives enough in all the world's dictionaries to describe the mentality of whoever decided that joy riding goes against the basic principle (which it clearly doesn't). According to The Telegraph, Mr Loophole even says that you might be void your insurance by doing so.

"Dick" by name, dick by nature...

From The Evening Standard:

Britain's most senior police officer has described the legalisation of cannabis in Canada and parts of the US as "interesting experiments" that should be watched... She said the debate around the subject was "complex"...

No it's not, it's perfectly simple.

... and believed if the UK was to legalise drugs immediately, it could lead to a variety of health problems.

Nonsense. We know from places where they legalised it that usage does not change massively (up or down), so there is little or no net effect. I, and I assume most people, don't like the stuff and wouldn't be interested even if it were legal.

However, speaking to radio show host Eddie Nestor on Monday, Dame Cressida said: "I think it is worth looking at what is happening in Canada and parts of the United States, albeit we have to recognise culturally that is very different."

Very little is 'happening', that is the beauty of it. As to 'culturally very different', she really is scraping the barrel. A sane person would consider Canada, the USA, Portugal, Netherlands as 'culturally very similar' to the UK.

"My concern is, I’m not a health professional, but you see what is happening with skunk and some of the damage done to people with mental health issues, is absolutely huge."

No you aren't, and no it isn't.

"The organised crime groups, in my view, would come in and cause problems in different markets and start selling different things to people. Let's see though what happens."

Wait, what? "The organised crime gangs would come in"??? They're already in! If you make something illegal, you end up with criminal gangs (Prohibition in the USA). If you legalise something (repeal Prohibition), the opposite happens.

And nobody said we should make the really strong varieties legal, that's no argument against legalising (and of course regulating and taxing) the normal strength stuff. You might as well say that because it's (quite rightly) illegal to drive a car that's not roadworthy, that you should simply ban all cars.

Oh the irony...

Emailed in by Lola, a video on how Amazon is buying up vacant shopping centres, the ones that went out of business partly because of online shopping ( or 'glorified mail order' as I call it, to put it in context), and using them as warehouses/distribution centres, and presumably collection centres for people in a hurry.
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Also emailed in by Lola, from The Telegraph:

The perilous state of Sir Philip Green’s retail empire has been laid bare in a 312-page tome sent to landlords as the former “king of the high street” pleads with them to help save Arcadia from going bust.

The document reveals that Arcadia’s earnings have crashed from £215m to just £30m in the last five years – a fraction of the £100m of extra costs, including pension contributions and debt interest, it is on the hook for...

Landlords' response: “We are not minded to support Philip Green ­because he took a perfectly good business and extracted money rather than investing.”

Pots, kettles.
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From the BBC, this morning:

Meanwhile another leadership hopeful, Home Secretary Sajid Javid, has vowed to recruit 20,000 new police officers.

Writing in the Sun, Mr Javid says: "More police on the beat means less crime on our streets. Not exactly rocket science is it?"

BBC Reality Check says, under the Conservative and coalition governments, the number of police offices has fallen by somewhere between 19,000 and 22,000.

I'm not sure why the BBC even bothered to link to the source of the figures for the reduction, this is more or less common knowledge.

I misread this Met Police advert on the Tube

No, that's the opposite of what they should be doing...

From The Evening Standard:

BT is facing demands from councils and police to disable the free calls function on its new “smart” telephone boxes amid claims they facilitate drug dealing and anti-social behaviour...

One drug gang is thought to have made £1.28 million worth of sales from a panel in Whitechapel. After the call facility was switched off, there was a “significant decrease in anti-social behaviour” in the streets around the phones, a council spokesman said.

Assuming that catching drug suppliers and their customers is a worthy aim (it isn't, but the law is the law), that's the opposite of what the authorities should be doing. This is an ideal opportunity for a bit of easy data mining and a fishing expedition!

Firstly, don't flag up that you know something which the other side doesn't appear to know that you know.

Sift out which 'phone numbers are rung most often and which of those result in clandestine handover meetings.

Maybe some customers are so dumb as to withdraw cash from nearby cash machines. So you know exactly who they are, with corroborative photos from the banks' CCTV, or maybe clear up a debit card theft.

Follow callers on CCTV or for real - nowadays, it is perfectly normal to see people standing or walking around wearing an ear-piece, staring at and talking to a mobile 'phone. They can use that to see CCTV footage while keeping in contact with base - now you know where they live and/or where they meet.

Clearly, you don't want to nick customers or suppliers a few minutes after they've put in their order from the public 'phone, that would give the game away, so spend a few weeks or months getting plenty of CCTV footage and incriminating photos, compiling your list of 'phone numbers, names, addresses, when the deliveries seem to come in etc.

Finally, you do a dawn raid in random nearby areas at random intervals and present the Court with some nice fat folders full of evidence.

(If you just turn off the 'phones, suppliers and customers will find some other way of getting touch, making the police's job all the trickier.)

Job done.

Until the next generation of drug suppliers steps up to the plate, rinse and repeat until they legalise,  regulate and tax the supply of the stuff.

Re Former Tory's comment on police pensions

From the comments to yesterday's post:

Former Tory: Depends where the money's going. Police people are vastly expensive individuals when you take in the cost of their generous pension scheme, which for some officers has allowed retirement on full defined benefits at 48 (entry 18 + 30 years service).

The current schemes are slightly less generous but funding retirement for someone in their fifties with index linking, widow's benefits, etc etc is colossally expensive, requiring a pension fund significantly into seven figures. Or, indemnifying by the taxpayer.

From here:

Typical retirement income:

A 30 year old police officer on a salary of £30,000 will receive a pension of around £28,000 if he retires at age 60. If he takes the maximum tax free cash at retirement - £120,000 - this will reduce his annual pension to £18,000.

OK, let's ignore inflation increases and discounting and assume thirty years working plus twenty years in retirement. Total lifetime earnings/income = £1,460,000. Divide that by thirty active years = £49,000 a year. That is the real annual salary. As a financial adviser, FT really should be able to do this calculation.

If you think coppers are overpaid at £49,000 a year, then become a copper. That's clearly overpaid if you are just sitting in a cosy office investigating 'hate crimes' on Twitter, and probably 'about right' if you are doing a proper policing job on the streets with all the personal risks and unsociable working hours.

And... we're back to normal.

From the BBC:

Police have launched a criminal inquiry into allegations of anti-Semitic hate crimes within the Labour Party.

Met Police chief Cressida Dick told the BBC her officers were assessing online material because it appears "there may have been a crime committed". It comes after LBC Radio obtained what it said was an internal Labour document detailing 45 cases, involving messages posted by members on social media.

Ms Dick says the Met had a duty to assess the material and not dismiss it. She told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that her officers were seeking advice from the Crown Prosecution Service.

Why not focus a bit more on knife attacks, acid attacks, terrorist plots, moped muggers and all the other real crimes that really affect people?

Women talking sense

Item 1, from the BBC:

People who believe the myths spread by anti-vaccine campaigners "are absolutely wrong", England's top doctor has said. Prof Dame Sally Davies said the MMR vaccine was safe and had been given to millions of children worldwide but uptake was currently "not good enough"...

"A number of people, stars, believe these myths - they are wrong," she said, "Over these 30 years, we have vaccinated millions of children. It is a safe vaccination - we know that - and we've saved millions of lives across the world. People who spread these myths, when children die they will not be there to pick up the pieces or the blame."

Uptake of the MMR vaccine had reached a good level in previous years but has now dropped back to 87%.

"That means a lot of protection but it doesn't give us herd immunity," Dame Sally said. "So when people from abroad have been coming in, travelling infected, it is spreading into our local communities."

I'll mark her down for the platitude 'local communities', apart from that, agreed.

Item 2, also from the BBC:

Chief Constable Sara Thornton said forces were too stretched to deal with "deserving" issues, such as logging gender-based hate incidents... She called for a "refocus on core policing".

Ms Thornton told police chiefs and police and crime commissioners: "We are asked to provide more and more bespoke services that are all desirable - but the simple fact is there are too many desirable and deserving issues."

She added: "Neither investigating gender-based hate crime or investigating allegations against those who have died are necessarily bad things - I just argue that they cannot be priorities for a service that is over-stretched."

... Since 2010 police chiefs say funding in England and Wales has decreased, in real terms, by nearly a fifth, and there are 20,000 fewer officers.

Spot on. It's not hard to understand, is it?

It's third time unlucky though:

Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott said forces could not do "more with less". Police should not have to "pick and choose" between crimes, and if misogyny was made a hate crime the government must provide the funding to tackle it, she added.
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UPDATE. Jonathan Bagley in the comments:

I know that there are many ways of recording crime and new crimes are being invented, but according to the crime survey, crime has fallen from a peak of 19 million offences in 1995 to 6 million offences in 2016. Doesn't that alone suggest we need fewer police? I've heard no mention of this.

I live in a small town in the North of England. In the early 90s there were more break-ins, more car crime and huge amount more drunken vandalism and criminal damage. Crime now, apart from some drug dealing, seems virtually non-existent and this is not a wealthy middle-class place.

Agreed, crime has been on a downward trend in developed countries for centuries. Steven Pinker has made a career out of reporting this. This has been particularly noticeable over the last few decades, when those born before they stopped putting lead in petrol had passed prime crime-committing age (allegedly, but it's the best explanation we have).

But:

a) However much - or little - crime there is, there is always too much, from the point of view of victims.

b) The economic optimum level of crime/policing is where £1 extra spent on police reduces the total cost of crime by £1, spend any more and it's money wasted. But it's difficult to measure or value distress, worry, trauma etc (the bulk of the true cost of crime), so best go on the safe side.

c) We have got softer as we have become more civilised. A few centuries ago, if somebody was murdered, it was just bad luck and few people cared too much, widow or widower remarried and moved on. Nowadays, it's a heck of a blow to a large number of relatives, friends and colleagues. So the "cost" of crime might be going up even if the absolute number of crimes is going down.

d) The Tories have been reducing police budgets and numbers too far, too fast, and/or encouraging them to focus on non-crimes as listed by Ms Thornton. There does appear to have been an increase in crime rates over the past few years - especially in London which has had a particularly right-on Mayor - bucking the long term trend.

Criminologists baffled by new crime stats.

From the BBC:

Gang-related violence has plummeted in London since the 2011 riots despite a recent spike in violent crime, according to new figures.

There have been 89 violent deaths in London since January and violent crime has risen by 40% since 2010. Gang-related violent crime has nearly halved over the same period, according to Met Police figures obtained by the BBC.

Meaningless comparison as per usual, all violent crime (probably a reliable figure) is up to 200,000 incidents a year.

For reasons best known to themselves, the Met are categorising a much smaller share as 'gang-related', from half a per cent of all violent crime in 2010 down to a quarter of a percent in 2017.

They might as well classify no violent crimes as 'gang-related' (however defined) and trumpet the fact that they have eradicated it.

"We don’t know why deadly crime is rising in London, says government that cut 20,000 police"

Newsthump hits the nail on the head.

The world has gone completely mad.

A lot of diesel cars are clearly labelled 'diesel' somewhere near the filler cap so that you don't put in petrol by mistake, that's a good idea.  I can never remember which fuel my wife's car uses, so it's good that there's a visual reminder that it's a diesel. If an organisation runs a large fleet of cars with lots of occasional users, I suppose it makes sense to label the petrol ones 'petrol' as well. That's all fine.

But I walked past a parked police car today and noticed that next to the filler cap, in one inch high letters was the word "UNLEADED".

FFS, can you even buy leaded petrol any more and if so, where? I thought you had to buy unleaded and chuck additives in.

(I didn't dare take a photo to prove it because some coppers don't take kindly to that sort of thing, and I was going to take the piss out of them anyway).

Nearly as stupid are all the vehicles with a sticker on the back saying "Limited to 70 mph". That's the maximum speed limit anyway, so nobody would reasonably expect them to drive any faster.

Good old-fashioned policing

From The Telegraph:

A spokesperson for Greater Manchester Police said: "Sam was in a critical condition and despite the best efforts of emergency services he sadly later died at hospital.

"He was a talented footballer who had recently started playing for Hattersley FC. He went to Audenshaw School with many friends and lived at home with his parents Sarah and Gary in Denton.

"He has a big brother called Scott, 21, and an older sister called Charlie, 20, and had just become an uncle to his brother’s new baby, Lilly.

"His family said they are completely heartbroken by their loss and although nothing will ever replace losing Sam they hope everyone remembers him for the fun, outgoing and friendly boy he will always be."

Sergeant Lee Westhead, of GMP's Serious Collision Unit, added: "My thoughts are with the victim's family who are being looked after by specially trained officers at this difficult time.

"Whilst we work to uncover how this has happened and piece together the moments before the collision, I am asking the public to help in any way that they can.

"If you were in the area at approximately 5.25pm on December 1 and saw a pedestrian on the motorway, or have dashcam images, please get in touch and share this information."

In accordance with time-honoured tradition, they thank the other emergency services, read out the victim's CV and make a brief eulogy before getting down to the ugly business of calling for witnesses.

Fun Online Polls: Post-Brexit trade deals & Encryption

The results to last week's Fun Online Poll were as follows:

Post Brexit, the UK should…

Impose trade barriers and tariffs - 1%
Remain in the Single Market/EEA - 10%
Rejoin EFTA - 6%
Try and negotiate a custom deal with the EU - 10%
Revert to trading on WTO terms - 13%
Abolish trade barriers and tariffs unilaterally - 58%
Other, please specify - 2%

Good, I was with the majority on that one. Thanks to everybody who took part.
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There has been some mumbling along the usual lines about whether the services like Whatsapp should be forced to provide the police with 'encrypted' messages if the police obtain a warrant. See e.g. PC World (the magazine, not the shop):

"It used to be that people would steam open envelopes or just listen in on phones when they wanted to find out what people were doing, legally, through warranty,” [Amber Rudd, Home Secretary] said “But on this situation we need to make sure that our intelligence services have the ability to get into situations like encrypted WhatsApp."

Rudd told Sky News that end-to-end encryption has its place, but it is not incompatible with providing a system for law enforcement agencies to have access to information with a warrant, if absolutely necessary."

I personally don't see a problem, surely we can accept that a judge can sign off a warrant to tap your 'phone, steam open your letters or search your house if the police make a reasonable case.

Why should Whatsapp messages be any different? That's far from saying that the police should be able to routinely view all messages, emails and so on. The police have always been able to obtain warrants to search houses - that has not led to a situation where they routinely enter people's houses on a whim and have a rummage, has it?

Vote HERE or use the widget in the sidebar.

It's "low-HANGING fruit", you bozo!

From the BBC:

"The National Police Chiefs' Council (NPCC) defended the practice of paying informants - or covert human intelligence sources as they are officially known.

Deputy Chief Constable Roger Bannister, the council's lead on the issue, said: "The intelligence provided helps to prevent and solve the most serious of crimes and is vital in bringing offenders to justice through the courts."

But Neil Wood, who worked as an undercover police officer and ran many informants, told Radio 5 live the tactic has its limitations when it comes to drugs.

"Nobody wants to inform on the drug lords because of fears of violent reprisals, so it's only the low-lying fruit that gets caught out - and the trade continues regardless. Nobody can call that effective. Overall it does little to bring down the level of overall crime."

Classic British Understatement

From the BBC:

A man caught speeding at 154mph (247km/h) has been banned from driving for 56 days....

He was driving a [ghastly little hatch back] when he was stopped by police. Officers said they believed it to be the highest recorded speed on a Suffolk road.

Appearing at Bury St Edmunds Magistrates' Court, Howlett was also ordered to pay £365.

Suffolk police said the sentence was "disappointing". Inspector David Giles, from the roads policing unit, said: "I don't think it is enough at all. I'm really disappointed frankly. It's not a real incentive to stick within the speed limit, in my opinion."

IMHO he should have been banned for life and been forced to watch as they crush his car. The police have my full sympathy on this one.

French police are decent blokes: shock

From The Telegraph:

... the pair decided to scale the Eiffel Tower from the outside. Kingston describes the first moments of the escapade:

"We started the climb at 1am, narrowly avoiding the patrolling security – who seemed more like the French army as they were in full camo and had massive guns. We then wormed our way through what seemed like endless CCTV cameras. But once we reached about 20 metres up the side of the tower it appeared we'd made it through what would normally be the riskiest part of any climb..."

After a brief period of jumping from strut to strut as the sun came up, Kingston and his partner returned to the ground, where they were promptly arrested.

"We were handcuffed and taken to the local police station," says Kingston, "where we were held and questioned for around 6 hours before being released without any charges. so had to promise them I wouldn't climb it again for 3 yearst I can now officially tick the Eiffel Tower off my list."

Extortion?

How is the proposal by Bedfordshire's Police to fund its budget shortfall by rigorously enforcing speed limits materially different from the arbitrary road blocks set up in various third world countries by their police solely for the purpose of extorting bribes from motorists?


Update. Mark in Mayenne makes a valid point about road useage.  To elaborate, the third world road block bit is usually justified by a 'document check' or similar which can take hours, unless you pay the bribe.  And the bribe is often the only 'wage' they get.

Because as we well know, Switzerland and Norway are teeming with foreign criminals who they just can't deport or extradite...

From the BBC:

Fugitives across Europe will flock to the UK as a safe haven if it leaves the European Union because a series of laws and extradition agreements would be ripped up, the former head of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) has said.

In one of the strongest warnings of the dangers of a UK exit, Sir Hugh Orde said criminals would know that it would take longer to extradite them if Britain were outside the EU.

He said: “If I was a villain somewhere else in Europe and I’m escaping justice, I am going to be here because it is going to take a lot longer to get me back.”

In order to even this up, I suppose we ought to do a couple of fatuous non-arguments for leaving the EU, but so far, the in-crowd has given us the easiest targets.