(Voice of the Family/Liam Gibson) — According to the old joke, in Heaven the cooks are Italian, the mechanics German and the police are English. In Hell, however, the mechanics are Italian, the police are German and the cooks are English. While nothing is likely to change the perception of English cooking, the damage done in recent weeks to the reputation of the British police means that the joke is no longer funny.
In the aftermath of the killing of three little girls in Southport and the disruption sparked by their murder at the hands of a second generation Rwandan immigrant, the Labour Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer wasted no time in branding both rioters and those peacefully protesting against uncontrolled immigration as “far-right” extremists. The irony is that, while the violence erupted in traditional Labour strongholds, it is Starmer’s reaction to the unrest that is likely to drive Britain further down the road to authoritarianism.
The speed with which the criminal justice system kicked into high gear was remarkable. The determination of the authorities to make an example of anyone accused of fomenting violence meant that some who were merely on the periphery of events were also swept up in the process. So immediate was the response that custodial sentences were being handed down within a matter of days. This was all the more surprising given the routine failure of the English police to deal with crime generally. Reports into “effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy” of the forty-three police forces in England and Wales revealed that the rate of victim-based offences “brought to justice” in the 2021/22 period was just 8.3 per cent, down from 22.7 per cent in the previous year. The rate for all crime decreased from 27.8 percent to around 11 percent. The report concluded, “These reductions reflect a decline in performance across forces in England and Wales regarding investigating crime.”
