UK in Anarchy

By now, anyone reading this will surely have heard, and seen images of, the rioting all across London and other major UK cities. This is the worst that I’ve seen in this country for around 30 years. In fact it’s worse than what happened back then. Senior government Ministers, and the Mayor of London, have finally interrupted their holidays to come back to London; and not before time.

The Home Secretary keeps calling these rioters violent, criminal, thugs, which I don’t find helpful. That type of language could well inflame the situation even more. She’s also asking people who know anybody involved to report them to the police. That’s fine, but without evidence, the offenders can’t be convicted. Also, the prisons and young offenders institutions are full, so it’s doubtful that any brought before the courts would get any real sentence by way of punishment and deterrent. The police call that revolving justice.

Today, all police in London are being told to report for duty. We have 35,000 officers in London, but not many are trained to deal with these types of situation. There have even been calls to bring in the Army, which the government and police are still considering if the rioting continues again tonight. Police from other forces outside London have also been brought in to help those in the capital. The government cutting spending right across the board, including the police, is now reaping it’s consequences.

No one knows what the cause of this rioting is, apart from that it’s probably being copy-cat behaviour, and I’m sure it’s being co-ordinated by anarchists. In this case the social networks have played a huge part in what’s going on.

The public are, like me, appalled by these scenes across the UK. But, until we have an inquiry, we don’t know if it’s just a criminal element, or if it’s for other reasons.
To coin a couple of clichés, and for those in the UK who remember the TV show London’s Burning, that’s now all too true. And the nomenclature Thin Blue Line, for the police, has also never been more accurate.

We wait to see what happens next. As you can imagine, I’ve been glued to the TV news, again!