Wednesday 10 June 2009

A New Hope


Recently in a land very, very close...

It is a period of turmoil, the government is in disarray and the judicial system has lost all credibility. Sensing that the Emperor is losing influence over his Imperial subjects, three Chief Constables begin a rebellion. Other Chief Constables from around the Empire watch intently, waiting to see the outcome, waiting for their opportunity to overthrow the tyranny of Darth Brown.


One Chief Constable to directly challenge the authority of Lord Brown and his minions in the Imperial Home Office is Peter Fahy of Greater Manchester Police who said, "The performance regime of the last few years has produced a style of performance management which is focused on the figures themselves as the outcome and sees compliance with processes as the best way to produce that outcome. At its worse it becomes and inquest on what has already happened in an attempt to catch someone out. It does not lift the soul." Will he succeed? Will he keep his job? Whatever happens to him, I have no doubt that his officers admire him, as do I.

The next Chief Constable to attack Emperor Brown's weakened regime is Mark Rowley. He was not pleased to learn that his budget will be slashed by £1.6 million pounds, effectively meaning that he will have to lose 50 police officers and staff next year. The cost of re-billing the Surrey tax-payer will cost £1.2 million, meaning that any potential saving will be negated. He has decided to seek a judicial review over the matter in a direct challenge to the authority of the government. Again, will he succeed? Will he keep his job? Regardless, along with his officers I am sure that the people of Surrey are relieved to see a senior police officer challenging the lunacy of our masters.

Finally, we have Colin Port the Chief Constable of Avon and Somerset. I won't say much on this matter here, as this is the subject of my next posting on Police Oracle, which you can either link to here or on the Inspector Leviathan icon below. In short, he's refusing to return hard drives containing 2,500 indecent images to a discredited 'expert' and risks going to jail. It's a risk he's prepared to take. If he can identify just one child from these images and rescue them, he will have fulfilled his duty as a police officer. What a man. The law is an ass, we all know it, and sometimes what is morally right has to take precedence.


Would you be prepared to go to jail over this matter? Think about it. You'll lose your job, you won't be able to pay your mortgage, no one will give you a job when you leave prison even though they will be singing your praises as you're led away to your prison cell, and you still have your own family to support.

Or should Mr Port accept the ruling of the High Court Judges? They have applied their interpretation of the law to this matter. The law stands. It can only be appealed against and should this fail, well it's just something you have to accept. Injustice is served upon many people daily. What makes Mr Port any different?


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10 comments:

  1. The reason so many idiots have the helm of police services is down to the absence of thinkers in the ranks and their ultimate installation as chief, by virtue of undeserved fortune or Freemasonry. With no idea how to run a police force and unable or unwilling to sack the rogues and loafers, such incumbents resort to posing for pictures handing out first aid certificates or slogan dabbling.

    Mr Fahy should be safely greeted with that benign smile we reserve for the local pyscopath. His unoriginal anarchist whining and poll predictions are trademarks by which we identify his enlisting to the army of quangos and unelected politicians.

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  2. He won't go to jail for it, and it won't stop him getting a job. But there aren't many jobs around that pay as well as his current one so fair play to him.

    In terms of the Chiefs speaking out, why did it take bloggers to speak out for four years first before they had the balls to join in?

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  3. Anon,
    But 25 yrs ago when promotion may well have been a case of who you knew, rather than what you knew. we did get some Chiefs with 'cojones'.
    They were all outspoken and they told the press and their Police Authorities exactly what they thought.

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  5. Only one more year of the w@nkers. We'll see if a Conservative Government does any better. We can but hope. I for one will harass them until they get things sorted.

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  6. PC Bloggs, a point well made and it does beg the question as to why police bloggers have had to point out what is wrong with the service over the past 4 years, whilst the ubermenschen have remained quiet. I think the answer does lie in the fact that they sense a sea-change in government, and hope that they will retain their jobs before the next general election takes place. It won't matter to Mr Port what happens, he's 35 years in the job and will resign in order to preserve his lucrative pension before the courts make their move.

    As for the other comments, I agree also. There was a time when the boss was a person you knew had got there through sheer graft. Promotion was based on ensuring that we got the fundamentals of policing right, not introducing change because change meant promotion. When I go for the next rank, my evidence will be 'I introduced change by not having change but by enforcing stability, which is sill a change because we've not had stability since 1997". I wonder if it will work?

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  7. I see that Mr Port has complied with the court order and returned the hard drives to Mr Bates. It looks as though the Rebellion has ended before it began. Still, I think Mr Port did all he could in the circumstances. It would be quite easy for me to sit here and say I would have gone to prison over it, when the actual truth is that my wife would have said otherwise.

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  8. When promotion depends on one's loyalty to the "system" it must be very hard having reached the top to turn around and say "actually this is BS".

    What we need are people who aren't afraid to upset the status quo, but they seem to have all but disappeared across the land.

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  9. No offence intended Insp. LH but in the Colin Port case, what is the evidence that the guy with the images was a 'discredited expert witness'? Anything I've read elsewhere seems to imply that Colin Port was in the wrong.

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  10. "If he can [openly break the law and encourage others to do so], he will have fulfilled his duty as a police officer. What a man." - that's rather an "interesting" position for you to take?

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