London Riots

There has been rioting in London for the past three nights. Last night was the worst. Disorder was rife in the world's finest city. Few areas were left untouched. I was lucky. I was in one of the affected areas before everything kicked off. I got out.

As well as violence and arson looting has reached epidemic proportions.

Who the fuck do these bastards think they are? What gives them the right to destroy the livelihoods of innocent people? Why do they think it is their entitlement to help themselves to whatever they see fit?

I live next to a prison. I hope that very soon the perpetrators of this outrageous behaviour will become my neighbours.

The opposition benches and some media commentators have already started making excuses for this citing poverty, deprivation and cuts. Bollocks! Not all those in poverty are rioting and looting. Not all those rioting and looting are in poverty. The people committing these crimes are united by one thing and one thing only. They are arrogant, narcissistic, selfish, stupid and contemptible excuses for humanity who think it acceptable to ignore the laws of this great nation when it suits them.

The powers that be need to take action and they need to take it now.

The police  need to be given the equipment they need to disperse these crowds. This includes, but is not limited to, water cannon, baton rounds, effective protective equipment and more effective personal defence equipment. They then need to be left to get on with their job. The bureaucratic governmental interference with police work must stop. Absolve police of lengthy form filling and arbitrary targets... let them get on with being coppers. Unfortunately, people who choose to appropriate and propagate unrest and violence on such a scale may be hurt when the police step in to stop it. Live with it. If they don't want to get hurt, they don't have to get involved.

In the longer term, police pay must be increased, their pensions safeguarded and their powers and abilities respected. Again, they need to be left to do their jobs and satisfactorily rewarded for it. We also need more police officers. It is that simple. Last night, the Met was unable to keep up with all the trouble having to race between scenes and hastily prioritise events. They did this with the assistance of other forces but, from what I can tell from the press, London was not always in their control. This is not a criticism of the police. I think they did a fantastic job under extraordinary circumstances. Their courage and bravery should be commended.

The courage of the ambulance services and the fire services should be noted and commended at this point. They have continued to do their duty treating people caught up in the violence and trying to minimise the damage caused by this. They have done this in addition to their normal workload and often coming under fire from the mobs whilst doing so. This takes bravery, professionalism and courage and I am grateful we have such services to rely on.

The Human Rights Act should also be repealed. We in Britain are a civilised nation. Legislation setting out how to treat others decently is as insulting as it is patronizing. Currently, the act is abused by wrongdoers - both criminal and civil - to try (and sometimes succeed) to get off with their misdeeds because they don't like the consequences of their actions and so their human rights must have been violated. This charade must stop. The Act should be repealed and in the mean time, the judiciary encouraged to take a more purposive (and pragmatic) approach to applying it.

Finally, people need to be given the right to defend themselves and their property. People may argue with the latter. Yes human safety will always take priority over material objects however the value of property should not be under-estimated. I have many things which I will vigorously defend should the need arise. Most don't have massive physical value but enormous sentimental value. This value is intangible but is still deserving of respect (the world would be a pretty bleak place if things were considered only on their monetary value). This is one of the main reasons why, "reasonable force" is utterly insufficient when applied to self-defence. Changes in the law recently suggests that Courts should put themselves in the position of the defendant to assess reasonableness in such cases. This is a step forward but in my opinion still pretty thin. In my opinion, the word "reasonable" should be substituted for the word "necessary" giving ordinary, decent people the full and unwavering protection of the law when protecting themselves and what is rightfully theirs.

That said, much as I am furious with the animals perpetrating this behaviour, I don't think vigilante action is the way forward. Taking on the rioters in direct conflict is simply lowering ourselves to their level. In addition, the disturbances caused by this would have to be dealt with by police. This could well be the straw that breaks the camel's back and lead to anarchy. Nobody would benefit from this. Better stay inside during the evenings and allow the police to get on with the excellent work they do. By doing this, we can allow them to assume that anyone out on the streets at night has a nefarious motive. If we want to make a statement I would urge participating in the cleaning operations going on around London. By doing this we can show the rioters that we are better than them, we are above their pathetic behaviour and we will not have the environment we live in spoiled by them.

Finally, may I refer you to the excellent blog Police Inspector Blog. It is written by a serving police officer and provides commentary from a police perspective on issues affecting us all.

I hope that tonight doesn't provide an encore for the trouble we have seen but I fear it might. In any event, I hope this dies down promptly and civilisation can be restored. In the mean time, I wish all police, fire and ambulance crews the best of luck in the days to come. I hope we shall see no further injuries amongst your ranks.