| Archive for Downsizer For an ethical approach to consumption |
| Jonnyboy |
Are police trying?As you may or may not know I work in one of the less inviting parts of Belfast, the following just unfolded across the road from my office.half a dozen lads, 12-16 years old come flying down the road with a trolley laden with pallets, down the middle of the road. The pallets fall off and hit a parked car, the lads continue to mess around in the middle of the road, and then put the pallets back on the trolley and send it flying off down the hill out of sight. A police car turns up with three policemen in it, stops by the lads briefly (like one second) then drives up to the damaged car and pallets left behind and proceeds to clear up the mess and talk to the now arrived driver. At no point do they attempt to apprehend any of the lads. Who wander off into the estate. Police now gone, in opposite direction to where the lads walked off. Driver now left on his own next to stacked pallets. Hardly inspiring is it? |
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| gnasher |
My sister had to phone the police to her work place the other day cos a bunch of lads were fighting in the visitor centre. The guy in the call room asked if it was the fight he could hear in the background. She said yes, he said he would send someone immediately.
In the end her and her colleagues manage to calm the fight down and disperse the lads. 20 mins later, the telephone rings, its the police - 'do you still need us?' 
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| lottie |
Saves on paperwork doesn't it? | ||||
| AnnaD |
We've been phoning the police for the past year concerning a neighbour. The wee ned keeps playing very loud dance music in his Granny's garage both during the day and at night. And it's not just been us phoning to complain either, half the neighbourhood have a problem with him. Yet the police have done nothing about him and neither has the council. I suspect it may have something to do with the fact that his Dad's an ex-police man.
So we have given up on the poice for any form of help, they are just so useless. |
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| LynneA |
We had terrible trouble at the old allotment site with a prowler. He was sleeping rough and if spotted, would torch the shed nearest where he was challenged. Towards the end, he started damaging cars.
The first time we called the police, they arrived 40 minutes late. The next, they went to the wrong site. Another time they refused to log the call unless I gave the full post code of the location I was calling from. In between these calls, we spotted a bunch of lads starting a fire on the waste ground next to the site. We got two carloads within 10 minutes. |
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| twoscoops |
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_east/7551176.stm Keep trying! |
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| AnnaD |
That gives me a bit of hope. But there's still the issue that I think his Dad gets him out of trouble being an ex- police man. We will keep trying anyway! | ||||
| Brownbear |
Police are a waste of time. Your only option is to secure your property to the best of your ability and hope for the best. Not that I would say Turkey was the best example of how to order a society, but last week I was told of how one chap's father 'back home' had disturbed and shot dead a burglar about midnight. As it was late he didn't want to bother the police with such a trivial matter, so waited till the morning to call them to come and pick up the corpse.
Not the best way to manage things as I said, but it would be nice to find a happy medium between that attitude and the one here, where burglars get a fine they don't pay, and householders are afraid to defend themselves in case (a) they get stabbed, or (b) they get arrested, or (c) they get sued. |
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| Jonnyboy |
The thing I found laughable was a few weeks ago some minister was whittering about how citizens should be more proactive in assisting the police. | ||||
| tahir |
I think I've done well at restraining myself from commenting on the really bad policing that I see every day. Mind you, things have moved on a lot from the days when it was OK for coppers to be on the take, and call people wogs, queers and pakis. Corruption and racism nowadays are nowhere near as visible.
On the other hand the police are almost fighting with one hand tied behind their back, a dog handler I know had his dog suspended for 6 months because it bit a drug dealer during a raid. This means that the officer was effectively out of service for the same period. I know I wouldn't want to be a police officer, and I know that without a police force we couldn't really function. What does that say? I don't know. Reading this thread must be totally dispiriting for any police officer. |
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| Erikht |
I like the police. They make my society safe from thieves, murderers, hooligans, bad drivers and environmental nut jobs. I don't like the laws that stop them from doing their job, but that's not their fault. All in all, everything would go to hell without them, and we would end up a bit like Turkey, were you can legally shoot people for doing a bit of forced entry.
In my book (and my country), it is only the suspect that has problems with the police. |
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| tahir |
Yup |
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| lottie |
I still think the amount of paperwork they are loaded with now for the simplest incident means they are less available and have a natural reluctance to go to situations where all they'll end up with is more paperwork and no improvement in the situation. | ||||
| marigold |
http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/3579434.Brighton_woman_s_noisy_sex_life_lands_her_in_court/ In England and Wales it's the council's job to sort out noise nuisance, so chase them for a solution not the police. Council website should tell you the procedure. It may be different in Scotland, though. |
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| Brownbear |
It strikes me that 'excessive paperwork' is a very handy excuse for sitting in the station drinking tea rather than getting out and nicking crooks. Nobody actually forces the police to go out arresting schoolchildren for playing Cowboys and Indians with a cap gun ('possession of an imitation firearm'), and turn a blind eye to violent hooligans.
The constant calling for new laws or harsher sentences by the police would also carry more force if they devoted more effort to enforcing the existing ones. If a criminal only stands a 1% chance of getting caught and being given six months, is he going to be put off more by the thought of an increased sentence, or an increased chance of getting caught? A 1% chance of five years rather than six months, or a 50% chance of getting caught and given six months, which would be the greater deterrent? I am a law-abiding person, but I do not regard the police as being on my side - I would be more nervous at being approached by a policeman in the street (have I got a penknife in my pocket? Am I parked illegally? When did I last check the tread on my tyres?) than by a yobbo. |