Dishonours

I have never been a supporter of the Honours system in this country. The whole set up seems to belong to another age. We have knighthoods, lordships and such for the great and the good and MBE's Etc. for the hoi polloi who have been judged worthy of a bauble and who are made to feel part of the system for a day at the palace.

To try and give the system credibility, more recently, some of the hoi polloi have been given senior honours. The whole thing has however lost all credibility. Failed civil servants and politicians are given honours to help them disappear quietly. 'Celebrities' are given honours to try and show the Government are human and in touch with the people. Worst of all, all political parties are simply selling honours to anyone prepared to donate £100 k or more. The system is a farce.

I am pleased that people like Bradley Wiggins and other athletes have been honoured. Inevitably, Bernard Hyphon Howe has been given a knighthood. It seems that you cannot have a Met Commissioner without a title. The decision regarding this would have been made before the
'Plebgate' incident, of course.

Sir Bernard Hyphen Howe

I am disappointed that PC Kate Brookman from Sussex has been given a QPM. She has been a police officer for 26 years. For 17 of those years she has been a Neighbourhood Schools Officer. She has also been a communications officer and a crime scene support officer. She has been rewarded for her dedicated work with young people. We all know people like PC Brookman; lovely person, dedicated to their role but at the end of the day her career has been nine to five in an office with Christmas off and little chance of getting her hands dirty. When will we see an officer given a QPM for a consistently high arrest rate?

PC Kate Brookman QPM

 



Most disgraceful, of course, are the awards for failure, which devalue the whole system. Hector Sants was CEO of the Financial Services Authority from 2007 until he stepped down quietly in June 2012. (Fear not for his career. He will take up a new post with Barclay's Bank in 2013.) He was in charge of overseeing the banks when they nearly bankrupted the country. He has been rewarded for leading the reform of the FSA and for learning the lessons of the disaster he partly had responsibility for.

Happy New Year!

Questions For the New Met Commissioner

Bernard Hogan-Who?

Well Bernard Hogan-Howe is the new Met Commissioner. What we know about Bernard is that he is pretty straight talking and doesn't mind ruffling feathers. We also know that he thinks he can run the Met despite the cuts that are coming. He is obviously not going to ruffle the Governments feathers regarding their proposed cuts to the police service. We also know that as the Chief Constable of Merseyside he cut back room functions and focused on the front line and reducing crime. Taking on criminals and gangs is his focus and we should applaud much of what he achieved in Liverpool.

The Guardian has spoken to a number of individuals and asked them what they want the new Commissioner to do. Her are a few of them.

Lee Jasper: ex-equalities adviser to London mayor
He should immediately request the prime minister to announce a royal commission into all suspicious deaths in police custody. I would also hope he would immediately seek to massively reduce the over-representation of young black people in stop-and-search figures. And finally they should abolish the 12th-century office of constable, which gives rise to so much discretionary policing that is not capable of judicial or professional challenge. We need a 21st-century conception of policing not one that relies on feudal law that is completely unsuited to modern times.

Pam Hothi: manager at Chaos Theory, the gang violence prevention charity

I'm a strong believer in building community relations and, given the recent riots, the Met have got a hard task in starting again. Without those relations, you're not going to have positive outcomes in getting people to engage … particularly gangs.
You need to work for and listen to your community that you serve. Zero tolerance policing won't work. Enforcement alone cannot solve the problem. You need a strong balance of enforcement and intensive welfare support. You can't lock everyone up. You'll only end up further marginalising that community.

Jody McIntyre: who was manhandled by police during student demonstrations last year (The Guardians words not mine)

The priorities for a new commissioner should be to end the complete culture of unaccountability that exists within the police and challenge the double standard that is clearly in effect. The police might be there to enforce the law but they are also subject to that law so, if a police officer is suspected of killing someone or mistreating someone in their custody, then they should face the punishment for that crime just like any other member of the public.


Well, Lee Jasper is going to be disappointed. Pam Hothi doesn't seem to understand what the function of the police is. Intensive welfare support is the function of other public services who are failing miserably. Jody McIntyre's comments just confirm what an ignorant bigoted cretin he is. The police have never been more accountable. And as far as I am aware if police officers kill people or mistreat them they are subject of the law. But unlike everyone else, police officers, as enforcers of the law, are subject to far more robust investigations than the public and far more serious sentences on the rare occasions they do break the law.

I have one question for the new Commissioner. At the peak of the riots in London, Jody McIntyre urged people everywhere to rise up and riot in their area. Specifically his post on Twitter said. 'Be inspired by the scenes in #tottenham, and rise up in your own neighbourhood. 100 people in every area = the way we can beat the feds.'

Since then he has tried to say that the tweet was made before the riots and he wasn't inciting people to riot. This is a lie. His tweet was made at 10.02 pm on Saturday 6th August. This was well after rioting started and had been posted all over Twitter and the television. We know that McIntyre will lie to try and substantiate complaints against police and now he is lying to try and escape justice.

I made a complaint to the Met police that McIntyre had committed the offence of incitement to riot. I know others did so too. I have contacted the Met and no one can tell me whether this crime has been recorded or whether any investigation has been carried out or completed. Can anyone in the Met tell me?

My question to the Commissioner is. "If you are going to be tough on criminals. If you are going to be brave and rise above the adverse media that will inevitably arise out of this case, when is McIntyre going to be arrested and charged with this offence?"