Radical changes to policing and criminal justice in Britain are needed to shake up an expensive and inefficient system that has left the public disengaged, an independent think tank said yesterday.
People had become “passive bystanders” who think tackling crime and anti-social behavior is the responsibility of Cabinet ministers rather than the local community, Reform said in a report.
It said successive Labour governments since 1997 had overly politicized crime, vastly increasing legislation and public spending while centralizing the justice system.
“The result is a move from Dixon of Dock Green to the Robocop of futuristic Detroit — mechanical, controlled from the center and lacking human interaction,” it said.
To reverse the trend, the think tank called for the creation of locally elected justice commissioners responsible for crime prevention, policing, prosecution and defense service, prisons, community work and probation.
This would create local debate and decision-making regarding prosecution and punishment, allowing, for example, Surrey to adopt a tougher approach than Yorkshire to prosecuting vandals.
Serious organized crime and terrorism should become the remit of a new National Bureau of Investigation, absorbing the national policing elements of London’s Metropolitan Police Service.
“We need to slay the myth that the home secretary is responsible for every stabbing and car theft on the streets of Britain,” said Elizabeth Truss, Deputy Director of Reform and one of the report’s authors.
Ken Jones, President of the Association of Chief Police Officers, agreed that there had been an unfortunate trend to centralize criminal justice since the 1990s.
“There are, however, encouraging signs that the centralizing tide is turning,” he said, noting recent government policy papers that recognized the importance of giving greater autonomy to neighborhood police teams.
But he rejected proposals for local justice chiefs and a national police force.
“Success against serious and organized crime and terrorists demands that our local teams are fully integrated and supported by the rest of the service,” he said.
Meanwhile, police charged a fourth man on Monday in connection with alleged threats to assassinate British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
Lancashire Constabulary said in a statement that 24-year-old Muhammad Ali Mumtaz Ahmad was charged with possessing an item suspected of being useful for the preparation or instigation of an act of terrorism.
A police spokeswoman said the charges relate to the alleged threat to kill the prime minister. She spoke anonymously in line with force policy.
Media reports said the men were being held in connection with a Web site posting signed “al-Qaeda in Britain” that threatened the life of Brown and his predecessor Tony Blair.
The statement, posted on a radical Web site earlier this year, demanded the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, and the release of some Muslim inmates from prison.
Police arrested two of the men, Ishaq Kanmi and Abbas Iqbal, on Aug. 14 at Manchester Airport in northern England, reportedly as they were about to board a flight to Finland. The men and Iqbal’s brother Ilya Iqbal — arrested in Accrington 56km north of the airport — were charged with terror offenses related to the same case last week. The men were described by police as being Asian, which in a British context suggests they are of Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi descent.
Ahmad and the other charged men are from the northern English city of Blackburn.
Greater Manchester Police on Monday were granted a warrant for further detention to question a fifth man arrested last Tuesday in the central English town of Derby.
Ahmad was scheduled to appear at Westminster Magistrates Court yesterday.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was