Police operations aimed at middle-class drug users could be stepped up after the Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, claimed that sudden bursts of violence can be linked to shifts in the drugs market.
There can be no denying (and anyone who has served in the police will probably also agree) that ‘turf wars’ relating to areas where large quantities of drugs are used by ALL CLASSES of people can and does lead to violent crime.
I saw it for myself whilst serving on an inner London borough in the Metropolitan Police – finding illegal drugs on office workers was just as common, if not more common, than finding drugs on people who hung around on the streets.
Although, to be fair, the individuals who hung around on the streets were more ‘clued up’ when it came to hiding their illicit stashes of various drugs.
In his speech at the Tory conference in Birmingham, Mr Javid will announce a review into who is supplying drugs and how they are being distributed.
To be honest though, rather than commissioning a costly review, he would be better off speaking to the police officers who are actually on the streets or the various intelligence officers who collate all of the intel gathered by front line officers.
The review will apparently look at all types of drug user, including professionals, as well as which drugs they are buying.
Cocaine….cocaine is what they are buying and most people get it delivered by legitimate couriers…there you go home secretary, you can have that one for free!
The results of the review will be used to help police and other law enforcement organisations like the National Crime Agency to crack down on buyers and sellers.
In reality, the men and women of the NCA and the police just need more resources – they already know who is supplying the drugs, where the drugs are coming from and who is buying them.
They just don’t have the manpower needed to tackle the problem head-on.
I wonder if the ‘review’ will also pick up this commonly held knowledge that is shared and understood by many in the various law enforcement circles.
Mr Javid, whose brother is a Superintendent in the Police said: “I am committed to ending the scourge of violent crime and will combat this issue using all the tools at the government’s disposal.
“We will not only deal with crime when it happens but will go further and strengthen our ability to target and prevent the root causes of criminal behaviour from finding the evidence, ensuring our services are working together and providing the right resources to the right places.”
There is, of course, no doubting that the home secretary’s desire to tackle this issue will be welcomed words by many people (apart from drug users and drug dealers).
However, whilst the Prime Minister still holds on to the position that there is ‘no correlation’ between fewer police officers in the face of more crime, then many will wonder: will anything actually be done to REALLY tackle the problem?
The issue, as I see it, is that when you have someone running the country who has not experienced the dark face of criminality, then there is, understandably, a large detachment in relation to having a grasp on understanding how criminals operate.
Not that a peaceful upbringing in the countryside is a ‘bad’ thing.
But when you start trying to talk about crime, the causes of crime and how to tackle criminal behaviour, then there is only such much you can learn from listening to the top brass and reading reports / sitting in briefings.
If Mrs May spent AT LEAST four weeks riding out with police officers on ANY inner-city borough, then she would realise, very quickly, that the ONLY way to tackle the menace of drugs is to have MORE police officers, open more police stations and build more prisons.
But that is, of course, just my own humble opinion based upon not only my time served on the thin blue line in the Metropolitan Police, but based also upon what we hear all the time from our 250,000 followers.
Written by one of the many admins of Emergency Services Humour who is also a regular blogger in our fortnightly eMagazine ’S__ts & Giggles’ which you can sign up to by visiting our Facebook page and clicking on the ‘sign up’ button or by visiting: ShitsAndGiggles.Online
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All the usual party conference chat which will never come to anything, said to appease the masses who still actually believe these people and to make a good PR headline. Good leaders take input from their staff and use it to benefit the team and the people they serve, politicians make it look like they’ve taken input then carry on without taking a blind bit of notice to the professionals on the ground then shift the blame when it goes pear shaped.