Whom do the Police Serve? Part Two

My point that I ( and you) pay the wages of police officers seems to have upset some people. One or two have (correctly) pointed out that by buying my newspaper, or reading my books, they contribute to my pay. Well, yes they do, but they don’t have to (though, amusingly, if I accept a fee from the BBC for an appearance, they have contributed to that). Whereas we are required by law to pay the wages of police officers.

 

Would we pay for them, if we weren’t? Would we pay voluntarily for a ‘service’ that often wholly ignored our profound concerns and our desire for peace and safety in our homes (see the case of Fiona Pilkington above all for the most prominent example of this, though my correspondence is full of similar, less dramatic instances)? Would we pay voluntarily for a service that was rude to us, or dismissive of us, or referred to us superciliously as ‘civilians’, which declined to patrol the streets on foot, which closed down most of its local offices and restricted many of those which remained to brief daytime hours; which ceased to enforce any traffic rules except speed limits ( and those through cameras incapable of making wise judgements about whether the offence is important or not), which couldn’t be bothered to investigate or act on ‘minor’ crimes, which just happen to be the ones which cause us most grief, which raced about the place in noisy cars with go-faster stripes, which arrested people for defending themselves, and which put political correctness before crime prevention?

 

Honestly, if someone set up a national business now, offering the ‘services’ provided by the modern British police, I’d be amazed if anyone signed up to pay for it. The police (like some other businesses I can think of) live on a reputation they won in the past, when they were an entirely different body. Most people only discover this when they need the police, and their fond illusions are vaporised by actual experience. I suspect that many of the defenders of the police on this blog are in this position, and while I very much hope their illusions remain unexploded by experience, I beg them to believe me that the above description is accurate.

Of course there are brave and dutiful individuals in the police, as we have reason to note today with the funeral of one of those killed in Manchester, but this does not in any way cancel out the faults of the police force (or 'service' as it now styles itself) as a whole. There are brave individauls even in my much-criticised trade, but their courage does not cancel out the failings of other journalists, or of the faults of the media as a whole. Nor should it prevent discussion of them.  

 

 I shall select three contributions for special attention. I have inserted my responses in their posts, marking my interventions ***

 

 ‘Angus’ says : ‘Somehow or other he (that’s me) knows exactly what happened during the Downing Street incident, enough to make a judgment it seems.’ ***PH :’ I don’t know ‘exactly’ what happened. But I read the newspapers carefully, so for instance I am aware that on 24th September my Daily Mail colleague Peter McKay wrote : ‘According to a colleague who works in Westminster, Mitchell had been in and out of Downing Street three times on the day in question — each time coming and going on his bicycle via the main gate. Only on the fourth occasion was he told to walk his bike through a small pedestrian exit.’

 ‘Angus’ continues: ‘Also, he has tarred all 100,000+ police officers with the same brush he used to tar those who didn't respond to the stone thrown through his window.’

 

***PH. What an odd charge. My complaint wasn’t against any individuals (I never met any. It was their absence that was the point), but was an institutional complaint against a police force that no longer patrolled, that had no local roots, and couldn’t find a simple address. Those roots were destroyed when Roy Jenkins compelled police forces to merge into bigger units, a preliminary to the de facto nationalisation which has happened since.

 

'This isn’t specifically about individuals. In fact it is specifically not about individuals.  It is about an institution in which people voluntarily work. So of course they are obliquely criticised for their acceptance of these things. Those who want to know the detailed and longstanding causes will have to read my book.

'As I’ve said before, since the Police Federation has been prepared to stage huge off-duty marches about pay and pensions, and to barrack Home Secretaries on the same subjects I must assume that the complete absence of any such protests against political correctness, targets, centralisation, Bramshill methods and the other curses of modern policing are a sign of acquiescence to those things.

 

 ‘Angus’ continues Some of the rudest people I have encountered have been nurses but I hope I don't judge all nurses in the light of a few bad experiences.’

***PH ‘So do I. Nonetheless, the existence of rude nurses, like that of offhand and uninterested police officers, should *in itself* warn us that these professions have changed substantially in recent decades . Such things didn’t happen 40 years ago’ .

 

Angus again ‘ I agree that the police have had some very bad press lately and I suspect that many people will have lost confidence in them. I have met some who have been inefficient and complacent but I have also met some who have gone beyond what is expected of them. My personal opinion, and it is no more than that, is that most of them try their best in difficult circumstances. However, they are very poorly led, often implementing policies that they do not agree with.’ PH : ‘Up to a point, see above, though if they don’t like it, they should surely protest through the PF. But many modern officers, who have joined since political correctness and modern methods became supreme, are willing and enthusiastic practitioners of the policing methods that many dislike. They know that this is the key to promotion and retention. ‘

 

 Tony Dodd, in a series of postings, says : ‘What a surprise. Mr Hitchens takes a contrarian view. The rest of the country is wrong.’ *** PH ‘Oh, ha ha, Mr Dodd. But he should know by now that I take my positions on the basis of facts and logic, and follow where they lead. That’s one of the reasons why I took a week to write a column on this matter (though I made some earlier comments on the cycling issue, here and on Radio 2). I don’t care if I’m popular or unpopular. Nor do I take positions for the sake of controversy.

 

 ‘ Mr Dodd ‘The behaviour of the police may or may not have been "officious and needless". Only those who were there can say.’

 ***PH ‘Is that so? Surely an action can be judged as officious by someone who did not witness it, but who has a good understanding of what happened. If Mr Dodd described to me a situation in which he was officiously handled, and the officious person’s spokesmen came to his defence, I would judge between the two accounts from my own experience and reach a conclusion, even if I hadn’t been there. We do this all the time. We can’t be everywhere.

 ‘ Mr Dodd asks ‘ Either way, how does this excuse Mr "I'm the Chief Whip" Mitchell's behaviour? (by "excuse", I mean "taking his side" against the Police.)’ ***PH ‘But it doesn’t. I specifically do not excuse (and specifically condemn) Mr Mitchell’s bad manners. Mr Dodd is quite intelligent enough to know this, and to distinguish between the issue of his manners and the issue of whether he was reasonably entitled to expect the gates to be opened for him. So he is muddying the waters here, presumably because he knows his case is weak. To ‘Excuse’ is blazingly obviously not the same ‘as ‘taking his side against the police’.

 

The word 'excuse' could not possibly mean that, and Mr Dodd knows it. This is brutal torture of the English language, and he should be ashamed of causing such pain and humiliation to an innocent verb. There are two separate issues. Only by separating them can the point be reasonably discussed. ‘Let me sum up. Mr Mitchell was wrong to be rude. The police officer was wrong to refuse him passage through the gates.’

 

Mr Dodd asks :’.How do undoubtedly true anecdotes about other policemen's behaviour, or the attitude of the police in general, have any bearing on the actions of this very senior elected representative?’

***PH ‘For the very reason he discusses above. Our experience of the modern police helps us to judge the truth and significance of the various statements made by the conflicting parties. My experience of Mr Mitchell, that he swears too much, likewise helps me to reach my own conclusion about how *he* behaved.'

 

 Mr Dodd: ‘ Two wrongs make a right?’

*** PH ’I have no idea where I have said that two wrongs make a right. Perhaps he could tell me.’

 

Mr Dodd then asks :’‘Who's defending the police?’

***PH ‘Several people on this thread are doing so, as far as I can see, including him. It is disingenuous of him to pretend that he doesn’t know this, nearly as bad as his torture of the word ‘excuse’, above, and his deliberate confusion of two separate issues. I have seldom seen Mr Dodd argue in such a slippery fashion, and am dismayed at the fall in his standards.

Mr Dodd asks :’ Why is it necessary to "take sides"?’

 **PH: ‘Because (like English trials and parliamentary debates) this is an adversarial contest, seeking to determine both the truth of what happened, and the significance of it. Both sides cannot simultaneously be right about whether Mr Mitchell was entitled to ride through the gates.

 

Mr Dodd : ‘OK, I'll try harder. Mr Mitchell is a rude, overbearing, cosseted and highly remunerated member of a dreadful government. He is a very fortunate human being. Perhaps being inconvenienced by an officious policeman is the worst thing that's ever happened to him. ‘

 PH ***This is just rhetorical blethers of no significance. Who said it was the worst thing that ever happened to him? Not I. Indeed, how did the whole thing become public at all? Not through him, I suspect. Mr Dodd knows perfectly well I don’t defend, or wish to defend, or seek to protect Mr Mitchell as a person or a politician. I dislike his party and his government. I think he has bad manners. Mr Dodd’s only rational purpose, by putting these words in his comment, was to suggest by implication to ignorant persons that I am defending Mr Mitchell and his government against the honest people of Britain. I am not.

 

Mr Dodd:'If so, I'm not sorry for him.’

***PH :’Nor am I. I just think the police were wrong to treat him that way’.

Mr Dodd: ‘ He is in a position to do something official about the gate opening arrangements, if it really means so much to him.’

***PH: ‘Actually, not now he isn’t. He’s been rendered totally powerless in the matter by his public humiliation, and he (and lots of others) will now have to wheel his bike through the side gate , as humbly as possible, for evermore, as all can see. '

Mr Dodd: ‘ The rest of us have to put up with such inconveniences all the time.'

***PH : Maybe so. But I don’t think we should (Does Mr Dodd?), and that’s exactly why I think the police should be critciised for this behaviour.

 

Mr Dodd: ‘ and if we behave as he did, we get arrested.’

***PH : But should the police be able to behave as they did towards him before he swore at them? ’ Is Mr Dodd trying to make an ‘ought’ out of an ‘is’ here? We know that this *does* happen. The question is, *should* it happen? *Should* the police be allowed to behave in this officious, jobsworth fashion? Or should they be restrained?’

Mr Dodd: ’That's why most people are annoyed at his behaviour.’

***PH’ Maybe they are, though a majority doesn't and can't determine truth or right. . But that could be because they have been manipulated into this view, as people so often are by skilful spin. What a pity it would be if the British people were recruited into a campaign to approve and encourage even more official police disdain for law-abiding people.

That’s what’s happening here. Mr Dodd is praising our transformation from a free people living udner the law into squeaking submissive serfs who humbly do what they're told by a uniform. Good heavens, that the Britain I grew up in should become such a servile place.

Well that’s Mr Dodd dealt with. Now we come to someone styling himself or herself ‘Pan’, who says:

 ‘In response to your comments about your article I wondered if you could answer the following question? What evidence is there to suggest the police leaked this to the media. The initial report stated that Mr Mitchell's rant was overheard by other civil servants and members of the public at the gates.’

***PH ‘I’m amazed that ‘Pan’ doubts that the leak came from within the police, and I should have thought that the subsequent involvement of the Police Federation, in an open condemnation of Mr Mitchell ( I believe they publicly called for his sacking), followed by the appearance in the Daily Telegraph of the actual police log of the event, rather pointed in that direction. It’s what you might call strong circumstantial evidence. Meanwhile, I’ve yet to hear of any member of the public who has complained. Why wouldn’t such a person have come forward by now?’

 ‘Pan’ asks :’What evidence is there to suggest Mr Mitchell has been allowed to ride his bike through the four vehicular gates?

***PH : ‘The account given (presumably by a political journalist) to Peter McKay and reported in the Daily Mail (see above). I repeat it here: ‘On 24th September my Daily Mail colleague Peter McKay wrote : “According to a colleague who works in Westminster, Mitchell had been in and out of Downing Street three times on the day in question — each time coming and going on his bicycle via the main gate. Only on the fourth occasion was he told to walk his bike through a small pedestrian exit.” This was prominently published, and repeated later that same week in the Daily Mail by the excellent Martin Samuel. I have seen no denial.

 ‘Pan’ continues :’ Why would anyone want to sit there waiting for these gates to be opened when they could simply push their bike through the pedestrian gate in a fraction of the time? (Or is he being awkward?)’ ***PH: ‘For the same reason that anyone in a car would object to be told to get out and walk through a side gate. Bicycles are road vehicles. They are just as entitled to the use of the road gate as are cars. I might add that nobody can come up with a plausible 'security' reason for all this. as I've said before, if it's safe to have gates opened at all, then they should be opened for all vehicles. If it isn't, then cars should be banned, as well as bicycles,  and Downing Street should be accessible only via a tunnel. ’

 ‘Pan’ ‘Do you honestly believe an police officer should summon a senior officer every time a member of the public protests against a disliked direction/instruction. If so can you imagine the consequences of such a policy?’

***PH. ‘No, nor have I ever said any such thing. I believe police constables should remember that they are the servants of the public, not their masters, and then this kind of thing wouldn’t happen. But if an officer really wants to be wooden and officious, the public should certainly be able to request the involvement of someone more senior.'

 ‘Pan’ ‘As you keep stating that we pay the police's wages, we are their bosses, do they not pay tax also?’

***PH :Yes, but so what? Police officers contribute nothing like as much as the public do (130,000 police officers are a pretty small part of the taxpaying public) , and the public are compelled to contribute those wages for the general good, and not their particular good.

‘Pan’ :’How should we measure police performance? Without some targets surely some officers would become even lazier.

 ***PH: I am told the old station sergeants were pretty good at keeping constables on their toes, in the days when the police did what we aid them for (patrolling on foot, preventing crime and disorder). That will do for me.

‘Pan’ As I purchase the Daily Mail on a daily basis I do hope you can find the truth in relation to these questions, because unless you write for free I do pay your wages!’

***PH; ‘Indeed he does, and I am conscious of it, though I should point out yet again that I do not write for the Daily Mail, but for the Mail on Sunday, a separate newspaper within Associated Newspapers, with its own editor and staff. But if he chooses to stop, then that is that. I can’t make him start again. Whereas, if I don’t like the way the police behave, I still have to pay *their* wages, under the threat of prison if I don’t. So does he. The relationship is quite different. And while I can tell ‘Pan’ what I think, I can’t tell him what to do.

 

My thanks to all the intelligent contributors who have posted their thoughts on the Christopher Hitchens Fan Club. No thanks to those who, quite inaccurately, accused me of whining or complaining. This was not my purpose, nor was it the tenor of my remarks.