Cameron's US adviser plan under fire
Source: Agencies |
August 15, 2011, Monday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
UK police chiefs yesterday attacked Prime Minister David Cameron's plans to enlist a US crime expert after last week's riots.
Cameron, criticized by some in his Conservative Party as being too liberal on crime and punishment, has taken a tough stance after four nights of looting and arson hit cities across England.
In an interview in the Sunday Telegraph, Cameron said: "We have not talked the language of zero tolerance enough, but the message is getting through."
The prime minister, who has suggested the initial police response to the riots was too timid, has enlisted former New York, Los Angeles and Boston police chief William Bratton to advise his coalition on how to tackle street gangs, which he blamed for much of the violence.
But senior police officers, who have criticised government plans to cut policing, have reacted sceptically.
"I am not sure I want to learn about gangs from an area of America that has 400 of them," Hugh Orde, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers, said. "It seems to me, if you have 400 gangs, then you are not being very effective. If you look at the style of policing in the US, and their levels of violence, they are so fundamentally different from here."
More than 2,800 people have been arrested and courts have worked round the clock and over the weekend to clear a third of those cases.
The riots have shocked Britons, many of whom are still asking why the mass disturbances occurred, and were allowed to spread so quickly from London to other English cities, with arsonists and looters apparently able to take over many streets with ease.
Cameron, criticized by some in his Conservative Party as being too liberal on crime and punishment, has taken a tough stance after four nights of looting and arson hit cities across England.
In an interview in the Sunday Telegraph, Cameron said: "We have not talked the language of zero tolerance enough, but the message is getting through."
The prime minister, who has suggested the initial police response to the riots was too timid, has enlisted former New York, Los Angeles and Boston police chief William Bratton to advise his coalition on how to tackle street gangs, which he blamed for much of the violence.
But senior police officers, who have criticised government plans to cut policing, have reacted sceptically.
"I am not sure I want to learn about gangs from an area of America that has 400 of them," Hugh Orde, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers, said. "It seems to me, if you have 400 gangs, then you are not being very effective. If you look at the style of policing in the US, and their levels of violence, they are so fundamentally different from here."
More than 2,800 people have been arrested and courts have worked round the clock and over the weekend to clear a third of those cases.
The riots have shocked Britons, many of whom are still asking why the mass disturbances occurred, and were allowed to spread so quickly from London to other English cities, with arsonists and looters apparently able to take over many streets with ease.
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