Over the last 72 hours we’ve all seen the mindless thuggery and violence on our TV screens. Young people smashing windows, looting shops and fighting with riot police. I think everyone has been shocked at the levels of violence and the fact it has gone on for so long. It doesn’t seem to have been started for any particular reason and I would disagree with the BBC’s description of these idiots as ‘protestors’ as they’re clearly not protesting against anything or anyone. They’re just opportunistic thugs.
That said, what this whole escapade has shown is that we need more police on the streets, not less. David Cameron and this Tory-led government wants to take more than 10,000 police officers off our streets over the next couple of years. There will be hundreds less in North Lincolnshire too. To put that into context, on Monday night there were 6,000 policemen and women in London. Double that number and take them away, that’s what the Tories – and our two local Tory MPs – want to do. That’s what they voted for. That’s what the records and history books show.
I don’t want to use the riots to make political capital. But this has shown a very, very important point – that the government’s cuts to police services are wrong and, at times like these, they need to be reversed. It’s not too late for the Tories to reverse their policing cuts. Our local MPs can table an EDM when Parliament returns to get the ball rolling if they’re seriously committed to what they are saying on Twitter. I don’t think there will be a single person reading this, regardless of political colour, who would not condemn the rioters and agree we need more police on the streets, not less.
Tags: Conservative, labour, mick grant, police, riots, Tory
