The public sector and local government will be bracing itself for the forthcoming budget given by George Osborne. If the coalition government’s plans to wipe out the fiscal deficit within this Parliament are to materialise then savings bringing spending to around 40% of GDP will be the main target for Treasury officials. It is on these occasions that public services feel the pinch and try to demonstrate their worth and mitigate any government cuts. Perhaps the most difficult, particularly from the Conservative’s perspective, is a reduction to the policing budget. Tough crime and penal policies have always been part of a Tory’s diet and a cut in police numbers would appear to be contrary to party beliefs. Under Mrs Thatcher, police recruitment increased by around 30% and was vital in her battles against striking miners.
David Cameron met recently with the former Los Angeles Police Commissioner, William Bratton, to discuss crime and policing strategy. Bratton worked for the Boston Police Department (BPD), the New York Police Department (NYPD) and, until recently, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). In all three posts he has managed to reduce crime in cities notorious with high drug and violent crime rates. His experience and judgements are intelligible and his justifications would make any politician stupid to ignore him.
For many years New York was ravaged by violent organised crime syndicates that disrupted the lives of its population. Bratton’s ideas were based on a criminology paper by George Kelly and Ray Wilson called the ‘Broken Window Theory’. Kelly and Wilson placed a brand new car in a rough neighbourhood and left it for 24 hours, when they returned they found there had been no damage at all. The next time, they broke a window and again left it for 24 hours. When they returned they found the car had been vandalised to the extent that nothing was retrievable, even the tyres had been stolen. The theory was that if the Police were ignoring minor crimes, and targeting serious criminals, then these petty crooks will be undeterred by the law and eventually fall into a life of tougher crime.
The ‘Broken Window’ was evident in many cities across America in the 1970s. In New York police didn’t stop drinking on the streets, gambling, graffiti or the infamous squeegee men that cleaned car windows at traffic lights. Statistics found that of the three million people travelling on the subway each day, 200,000 people were evading the fare. Bratton set out his taskforce to root out such delinquency by finding the source and stopping it in its track. As he stated, by stopping people from drinking on the streets you are stopping a potential fight or stabbing later on in the evening.
People were very critical of this style of policing because evidence suggested that ‘zero-tolerance’ policing was pushing crime to outskirts of the city. It is also seen as very authoritarian and suspicious of human behaviour. As Bratton put it, this style of policing is in the wider interest of society. The Police did not have a good reputation within ethnic areas of cities, and the violence directed at people like Rodney King did not help ameliorate such relationships. He suggests that Police need to control the behaviour of society because crime itself is only caused by one thing; human nature. These are influenced by the economy, demographics and racism but it ultimately derives from the individual. By placing Police on the beat it was repairing relationships in places historically deemed as no-go areas. Cops on the dots not only created compassionate policing but it helped to stop the source of crime.
Ideological lines are always drawn involving crime and punishment. Liberals despise the thought of giving up certain liberties for the good of everyone, but these theories have shown that they have been effective in driving down all types of crime in cities with unhealthy pasts. Putting people in prison is in fact a good thing for society. It not only removes certain people from society but endorses a combination of policing and the criminal justice system i.e. juries.
This is the dilemma Mr Cameron has. Crime is known to rise during recessions, particularly low level, but by cutting Police numbers he could be doing more damage than he wishes. Policing has evolved immensely in terms of technology and statistics, but these alone will not see people stop their errant ways.
David Cameron met recently with the former Los Angeles Police Commissioner, William Bratton, to discuss crime and policing strategy. Bratton worked for the Boston Police Department (BPD), the New York Police Department (NYPD) and, until recently, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). In all three posts he has managed to reduce crime in cities notorious with high drug and violent crime rates. His experience and judgements are intelligible and his justifications would make any politician stupid to ignore him.
For many years New York was ravaged by violent organised crime syndicates that disrupted the lives of its population. Bratton’s ideas were based on a criminology paper by George Kelly and Ray Wilson called the ‘Broken Window Theory’. Kelly and Wilson placed a brand new car in a rough neighbourhood and left it for 24 hours, when they returned they found there had been no damage at all. The next time, they broke a window and again left it for 24 hours. When they returned they found the car had been vandalised to the extent that nothing was retrievable, even the tyres had been stolen. The theory was that if the Police were ignoring minor crimes, and targeting serious criminals, then these petty crooks will be undeterred by the law and eventually fall into a life of tougher crime.
The ‘Broken Window’ was evident in many cities across America in the 1970s. In New York police didn’t stop drinking on the streets, gambling, graffiti or the infamous squeegee men that cleaned car windows at traffic lights. Statistics found that of the three million people travelling on the subway each day, 200,000 people were evading the fare. Bratton set out his taskforce to root out such delinquency by finding the source and stopping it in its track. As he stated, by stopping people from drinking on the streets you are stopping a potential fight or stabbing later on in the evening.
People were very critical of this style of policing because evidence suggested that ‘zero-tolerance’ policing was pushing crime to outskirts of the city. It is also seen as very authoritarian and suspicious of human behaviour. As Bratton put it, this style of policing is in the wider interest of society. The Police did not have a good reputation within ethnic areas of cities, and the violence directed at people like Rodney King did not help ameliorate such relationships. He suggests that Police need to control the behaviour of society because crime itself is only caused by one thing; human nature. These are influenced by the economy, demographics and racism but it ultimately derives from the individual. By placing Police on the beat it was repairing relationships in places historically deemed as no-go areas. Cops on the dots not only created compassionate policing but it helped to stop the source of crime.
Ideological lines are always drawn involving crime and punishment. Liberals despise the thought of giving up certain liberties for the good of everyone, but these theories have shown that they have been effective in driving down all types of crime in cities with unhealthy pasts. Putting people in prison is in fact a good thing for society. It not only removes certain people from society but endorses a combination of policing and the criminal justice system i.e. juries.
This is the dilemma Mr Cameron has. Crime is known to rise during recessions, particularly low level, but by cutting Police numbers he could be doing more damage than he wishes. Policing has evolved immensely in terms of technology and statistics, but these alone will not see people stop their errant ways.
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