This country takes the f'''ing piss.....

[Simcut]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/merseyside/7085654.stm

Read that. How the bloody hell can a Judge cut their sentence from life to 3 years and 3.5 years. Have you seen what those 2 SCUMBAGS did to that poor guy??? They beat him to a pulp, urinated on him and threw him in the river to die. Makes me fecking sick. So many things are wrong with this bloody country , I want to move abroad.....

Am I the only one that feels so strongly about this?

[Max Kane]

What a disgrace, they should serve life no question. Some of the leniancy shown to thugs is beyond belief

[Uberduck]

It makes me so worried for the future of the world that punishments for such crimes are so lenient. This story is the same as those kids that bullied that old lady and then one day when they saw her collapse in the street they pis*sed on her and kicked her. How can people be so violent and cruel? These sort of people are killers and get away with a manslaughter charge and 3.5 years in jail. How can that be? They should never be allowed out of jail.

I get annoyed even more by extremely violent killers and rapists that get small sentences. How can you let someone like tat back into the community? I dont care if you say they've served their sentence and that they've had time to change! If you do that once, you've always got it in you to do it again and therefore are not safe to be outside of jail.

The world is becoming more and more fuc*ked up by the day . It's probably worse in our country because of the lacklustre criminal law punishments but the sick people are very much worldwide.

That story on the news today where that English chick in Italy was killed. The possible theory floating about at the moment is that she refused group sex and was killed with a flick-knife by the three others. Thats sick.

[Simcut]

^ yep, bloody sick. What a beautiful looking girl by the way. Such a terrible loss

By the way, something else that is disgraceful is that Jean Charles de Menezes series of events. Police have blatantly lied

[Neuro]

By the way, something else that is disgraceful is that Jean Charles de Menezes series of events. Police have blatantly lied

That's another kettle of fish though, with all the likely SAS involvement. Thinking of which, there's some decent opportunities open in the SIS at the moment...

[Briggsy]

Yeah, absolute disgrace. It makes me ashames to be British when stories like this leak around the world for other countries to hear about. It makes us look like we don't take criminals seriously - and in all honesty, we don't.

Its like these people that get fined £150 for driving with an incorrect licence (usually meaning they're driving with a provisional license because they've never passed a test), no tax, no MOT and no insurance. Where's the justice in that when i'm paying £190 per year to tax my car, £600+ insurance and a £35 MOT. I pay £800+ to be road legal, whereas some nut that drives around illegally gets that privelage for £150 - and then does the same all over again when he walks out of court.

By the way, something else that is disgraceful is that Jean Charles de Menezes series of events.

I'm a bit mixed about this to be honest. We'll never know the TRUE story of what happened. The media tell us what they want us to hear because it makes news. The Police tell us what they want us to hear because they want to prove that they're full equipped to tackle terrorists should an incident occur in the future - plus they want to cover their own backs. The truth is, we don't know what happened - and never will. The only people that know the full story is those police involved in the incident, and the poor guy that got shot.

At the end of the day, if he had been a terrorist and the police hadn't taken action, they'd have been criticised for being too casual about it. He wasn't a terrorist, and they took the action that they felt necessary - and they're still being criticised - so they can't win either way.

From what I understand, Jean Charles de Menezes was told to stop more than once, but failed to do so because he had an invalid train ticket and thought he was going to get into trouble. Because he didn't stop, the police thought he was a terrorist and shot him.

If you've got coppers chasing you with guns, and you're told to stop because you're a suspect for something (even if they have ID'd you wrongly), then you'd be daft to ignore them. He ignored them, and was then shot. I don't usually defend the police because I don't always agree with the way they go about things - but on this occasion, I think some of the blame has to be put onto the victim. Its very sad that he died, and feel for the guy and his family - but the whole event could have been avoided if only he'd have stopped. He was daft to continue running at a time when security levels were at critical levels in London. Even if he did have a dodgy ticket, he'd have got a slapped wrist, a fine - and his life would have continued.

[Moonman]

for obvious reasons (i.e you never know who is reading) i will not go into the politics of policing and "sanctioned detections".

as an aside, I've always maintained the American style of Law Enforcement note that's not Police...but Law Enforcement, is how it should be done. Okay, they have cell space in the states to arrest anyone for something like Jaywalking and throw them in a cell...but we treat our criminals with kid gloves. There's nothing that makes my day more satisfying than a quick scrap to get a little s*** in the back of the fan - providing i don't mess up my hair of course. The American systems makes our Justice system look woeful. When an American officer approaches a suspect they fear the officer - and they should do. I'm not a believer in all the communities malarkey. I didn't join the Police to drink tea with Mrs Miggins or repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, for a simple shoplifting offense - i joined so i could catch toe rags like the above and basically, give them a taste of their own medicine.

Briggsy is right though, the police can never do right in the media's eyes. If we persistently pursue someone they see it as harassment, if we are quietly monitoring a subject then "we aren't doing anything". Everyone seems to like to get one over the Police.

Funnily enough though, lately i have been thinking about moving to the states or Canada. An old buddy of mine went there last year and it is tempting to go....

[Max Kane]

I didn't join the Police to drink tea with Mrs Miggins or repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, repeat myself 4 times on separate sheets of paper, for a simple shoplifting offense

Mrs Miggins? Wasn't she in Blackadder?

On a serious note I have to say that I feel the De Menezes case has been totally blown out of all proportion. It was a tradegy that he lost his life & there's no hiding from that fact BUT surely it is (and I'm being very Jack Nicholson here) worth the gamble taken, I mean in the context of when the incident occured (days after 7:7) & with the continued threat of terrorist activity, plus the fact that he chose to try & evade the officers. I feel that the marksman was correct. I feel like the only reason the issue is still within the public domain is for selfish politically charged figures to carry out their own agendas, be it replacing Sir Ian Blair at the MET or by highlighting their perceived ineptiude of the government.

The family of the guy don't seem too vocal now, they have done the right thing & tried to move on, it's now simply those mincey leftys who continue the debate trying to further their own needs

[Briggsy]

I didn't join the Police to drink tea with Mrs Miggins

See, I think thats what's wrong with the Police these days. The Police complain about lack of public support, etc, but thats because the Police don't "mingle" with the public like they used to. There needs to be a balance between being forceful when needed, but also sociable when needed too.

Last year, I saw a car, quite literally, dumped in the middle of a side road. It had obviously been joy ridden, and dumped shortly before I got there. Thinking I was doing the right thing, I flagged down a Police car that passed me, and raised it with them. Once copper was yawning his head off, while the other said "its out of our area mate - what do you expect us to do about it?"

It was about 1 mile from where the car was dumped - surely radio'ing through to have it looked at by someone in the area wouldn't have been too much to ask. I certainly won't bother again. If someone had crashed into the back of it at 30mph and killed themselves (bearing in mind it was dumped in the middle of the road with no lights on), then they'd have complained that nobody could bother to report it. Its those kind of incidents where the public lose faith in the Police - plus the way they talk down to you in a patronising manner all the time to make you feel as though you've done something wrong.

Not all coppers are like that for sure - I admire the bravery and determination of some of them, but then there are others that clearly have the job to feel like Barry big bollocks because thye've got some power when they're in uniform.

[Moonman]

i will always stop to have a chat with people if i'm about. If someone hollers me i'll see what their problem is or just have a chat. I like to think i'm approachable and not one of the "i'm too important for you" sorts. Actually, people normally come to speak to me. Admittedly it's usually something to do with my sleeve tattoo in the first instance (normally "i didnt think you were allowed into the force with tattoo's?") but it's an ice breaker. If say it's quite, i'll go and see that neighbourhood watch person to see what the local toerag is upto. But i'd rather be sorting something out that sat in somewhere drinking tea and being a bit more proactive. Maybe thats just me.

Also, Neighbourhood Police Team's encourage public relations and are damn good at it, thats how we get the intel to target say, cannabis factories, crack houses, and knock in shops. If we need to know something about someone living on High Street, chances are, one of the Neighbourhood Teams will knows loads about it.

But, there are a lot of officers simply in the job because of the power, the pension and the fact they're out an about and can flex the old muscles. You can straight away tell who those are and those, to be frank are best avoided. It does annoy me sometimes when i see colleagues like this. They are extremely lucky to be in the job which pays quite well, good pension and has not threat of redundancy and they don't realize how lucky they are. It's now extremely difficult to get into the police too. Over the last year or 2 the only way in is do your first year as a PCSO then wait until job line is open for regular officers. Thats what most forces are doing now. It's gone like the Fire Service has with waiting lists 2 years long.

[Neuro]

Well I have a thing or two to say about the police. Those people who've been on the board for while might remember I went to one of Dormouse's gigs (back in the early days) and I got punched in the face whilst driving some of the girls back afterward. A drunken couple just strolled up to my car on my way out from the car park, knocked on my window, and as I wound it down the guy started swearing at me and accused me of trying to run them over - and then, before I knew it the girl decided to throw in some fists (laden with rings, I tell you) before I drove hastily off... :blackeye:

Now suprisingly, apart from my damaged ego from being lamped in the face by a female, I wasn't too bothered by this - after all I was ok (the black eye would go at some point!), and my car was fine, but my passengers happened to know the culprit and insisted on calling the police, who duly came over and asked me some questions.

They did their job on the night, there wasn't very much they could do, but they were very pleasant, appreciated I didn't want to waste their time and I gather they gave a caution to whoever it was who hit me. But a few months afterwards, I get a phone call checking up on the incident, from some lady in a call centre, who was almost begging me to make a complaint. I had cleverly-phrased questions like:

If you could change one thing, what would you change about the policemen who attended your incident?

What do you think the officers could have done better on the night?

We you told the correct precedures and your options following the incident?

Were you dissuaded from following-up any pursuit of the incident in any way by the officers?

Do you feel they did not give you enough time when they revisited you?

Has your experience put you off contacting the police for a similar incident in the future?

..and it went on and on!

In the end I stopped the lady and said: look, they did their job, they were more than helpful, told me what was practical and what was not, didnt waste my time, and I was happy with them, therefore I do not want to make any complaint whatsoever.

For such an incredibly minor incident, I was amazed at the amount of fuss that was made in the followup afterwards, and imagined how much paperwork and time it wasted them. I know they have to check that the police are doing their job correctly but it was overkill to the extreme and the woman seemed shocked to hear I had nothing bad to say about them... surely that shouldn't be the case?

[Max Kane]

Did she punch you due to the fact you hadn't recruited her to your harem?

[Neuro]

Hehe, well I think if I had tried I'd have been given the stiletto treatment! :blush:

[Briggsy]

I've also got issues with the Police, but I don't want to stereotype them all as being useless because there are some bloody good coppers that risk their lives day in, day out - but there also some that have really annoyed me over the years.

1. When my car was broken into in a CITY CENTRE CAR PARK (resulting in a stolen stero system), it took them three days to come out to fingerprint the car - and when they did, they said I should have left my car at the scene of crime!! Yeah, so my lock is smashed off, my door won't close properly, and i'm supposed to pay to have my car in a car park for three days? Oooookkkk then!

2. We once had dodgy neighbours, and my dads car window was smashed on two occasions. Despite us reporting it, and telling them who it was that did it, they didn't even bother coming out to do anything. They just gave us crime numbers.

3. We installed a CCTV camera to catch our neighbours antics if they were on our property. Our neighbours were throwing objects near our cars, so we called the police. They came out two hours later, said bugger all to our neighbours, but FORCED us to take our CCTV camera down instead for "breaching public privacy rights". WTF??

4. If a house gets broken into, you wait ages for them to come out due to "lack of officers being available" but if you do 10mph over the speed limit on the motorway, you can guarantee Mr Plod will pull you over within a few minutes.

There's far too much emphasis on catching criminals these days - instead, they'd rather stick traffic cops galore on the motorway to pull over speeders. Why? Because the police get money for pulling over speeders. They get bugger all if they catch a burglar in your house.

Cynical perhaps - but to most of the public, thats the impression we get. Its very sad that in the year 2007, we can't have any respect for the Police, and they can't have any respect for us.

[Moonman]

you wait ages for them to come out due to "lack of officers being available"

that is the golden one. The good old double crewing policy after 2000hrs means that if there is a shift of 14 officers on, in reality you only have 7 "mobiles" nay coppers in vehicles to attend jobs as they are paired up. In the daytime officers are expected to be single crewed. This could explain why calls are not usually covered at night - because resources are kept aside for the "a-grades" the jobs where violence is imminent. It's a messed up system it really is.

So personally, what i think a possible solution could be is, to skew the shift patterns to accommodate peak call times. Yes we need officers on during the daytime, but i think it should be skeletal shifts or just the shift and keep the rest to work from 1600hrs onwards. I sometimes feel there is simply not enough cover from 1800hrs through to 0100hrs.

[Briggsy]

Personally, I feel a large portion of the blame is down to the government. I've no objections to the police charging speeders for speeding - however, what I do disagree with is when I see four traffic cop cars on a 20 mile stretch of road, but no officers available to attend a break in.

If the Police charge £60 per speeder, then that money should be re-invested in employing more police officers to make up for those that are patrolling semi-pointlessly on motorways. Instead, the fines are used as a profit making scheme - and the money pays for even more speed cameras. Its all about money at the moment, and not making roads safer.

In my opinion, speeders don't really cause any major problems anyway. Doing 80mph in a 70mph zone at 3am, or 40mph in a 30mph at 2am doesn't really cause any harm at all (if drivers are still driving carefully and being fully alert) - its the chavs that do 60mph in a 30mph zone that cause the accidents.

Personally, I think the biggest menaces on the roads are the d***s that continually change lanes on roads (especially motorways) without indicating, women that drive whilst putitng make-up on (its unbeleavable how many I see each day on the way to work!), people that drive on mobiles (which sees to have INCREASED since the law came in..), and tailgating BMW drivers. People that insist on driving with fog lights on in blazing sunshine are really annoying. And the most dangerous of all, in my opinion, are pensioners that insist on driving in the left hand lane of the motorway at 40mph because they're scared of busy, fast, motorways or they're not very confident drivers because they learnt to drive years ago when roads were much quieter.

I still think it should be law that EVERYONE has to have refresher driving lessons every ten years. If it makes roads safer, i'm all for it - and i'm happy to do it. If anyone fears having a test every ten years, then that would suggest that they're not very confident of passing it - meaning they're probably not very safe drivers....

OOh this thread has started off a right proper debate

[Moonman]

I still think it should be law that EVERYONE has to have refresher driving lessons every ten years. If it makes roads safer, i'm all for it - and i'm happy to do it. If anyone fears having a test every ten years, then that would suggest that they're not very confident of passing it - meaning they're probably not very safe drivers....

OOh this thread has started off a right proper debate

i have said this and i always will. We, as a nation do have a road problem that is only getting worse as vehicles get bigger or "pimp" in an American stylee. Have you seen the size of those bloody Audi Q7's, Range Rover Sports, Mitsubishi Warriors that seem to be the must have item for the bleach blonde 35 year old mother of two? Our roads just aren't built for them unlike the roads stateside. But, those type of vehicles i think are usually a symbol of status. I think these type of vehicles should be taxed to the hilt, i mean 4 or 5 times more than your average car.

Anyway, back to the issue of drivers being re-tested, yes they should. I have always said this, you'd wipe so much crap from the roads and make them safer at the same time. The only problem is, it will cause uproar for those that are dependent on their vehicles - which in itself is quite a worry.

Oh and for my money, the worse drivers are either those in Nissan Micra's - they drive them like they are juggernauts!, followed closely by Renault Laguna drivers, and Vauxhall Vectra drivers or those who have brought an '07 plate car, where they aren't used to driving it, are not cofident in its dimensions and are scared of "thrashing it for breaking it".

[Briggsy]

i have said this and i always will. We, as a nation do have a road problem that is only getting worse as vehicles get bigger or "pimp" in an American stylee. Have you seen the size of those bloody Audi Q7's, Range Rover Sports, Mitsubishi Warriors that seem to be the must have item for the bleach blonde 35 year old mother of two? Our roads just aren't built for them unlike the roads stateside. But, those type of vehicles i think are usually a symbol of status. I think these type of vehicles should be taxed to the hilt, i mean 4 or 5 times more than your average car.

Definately! I agree there. There's absolutely no need for a single mother with a kid to drive a 8-person carrying Land-Rover. There needs to be incentives to get people driving small cars again - such as free tax for people driving a 1.1 car or lower, and £1000 tax for a gas guzzling car.

I don't think its size of vehicles that is affecting safety though - its more a case of driver arrogance. The drivers that drive the bigger, more expensive cars seem to be the worse. They seme to think, my car is bigger and posher than yours, so i'm more important than you - so if I sit up your arse in the middle lane, you WILL move over for me. It doesn't work like that with me - I slow them down instead. There are far too many arrogant drivers on the roads.

The other culprits are the people that think they're the best drivers on the road because they've been driving for 20 years without a crash - but in reality, they're the worst drivers because they've picked up bad habits, become more casual because they think they're good drivers, and more often than not, completely oblivious as to what's going on around them because they don't feel the need to use mirrors, etc as much as they used to.

This is why pensioners are such bad drivers - they learnt in an era when there wasn't dual carriageways and motorways - because they weren't needed back then because roads were quieter, so they've never had proper tuition on how to tackle those roads, and therefore drive poorly. They also drive slowly because they know their reactions or mobility aren't as good as they used to be.

Its these people that need regular driving tests because they're a serious hazard to our road systems.

I also feel that there should be a height limit for drivers. The other day, I saw a woman driving a car that was tiny - she could barely see over the steering wheel of her car. People that small can't possibly see all around their car - meaning they can't see blind spots, etc. That itself poses a huge risk.

[Max Kane]

Will you two stop writing essays! It's saturday morning & I'm hungover. I wana contribute in my usually informative & all knowing manner but I really do not have the wherewithall to read that lot

[bigsteve]

I think they must have been bored at 2 in the morning!!

[Moonman]

we just like a good old moan really. i did come off shift at 0100hrs too!

[JasonB]

I cant be botherd either, too much input!!