Tag: UK

I Bet Things Will Get Even More Interesting In Britain Soon…

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…if this story is right:

Overcrowded jails reaching bursting point

by MATTHEW HICKLEY, Home Affairs Correspondent
00:24am 12th August 2006

Britain’s overcrowded jails are set to reach bursting point by the end of the month with the prison population reaching a new record high yesterday and spare places dwindling fast.

In the past week the number of criminals locked up in England and Wales has climbed by 175 to 79,094 – breaking the 79,000 figure for the first time.

Doing the math, that’s about, oh, 0.1% of the population of that region. By contrast, the U.S. currently imprisons about 0.7% of our population, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

At that rate, and with just 506 spare places left, absolute capacity will be reached in less than three weeks, forcing the Home Office into drastic measures.

Like building more prisons?

Officials insisted last night they were “concerned but not panicking”, (they leave the panicking to the public) and insisted they still hoped to avoid having to launch Operation Safeguard – the emergency plan to move convicted criminals into police station cells, at huge expense.

The looming crisis in the embattled Home Office is another blow for Home Secretary John Reid, who has promised to “rebalance” the criminal justice system in favour of victims.

Uh-oh. I’m getting a bad feeling about this…

Earlier this week the Mail revealed that hundreds hardened teenage criminals, including muggers and burglars, are to be freed from jail early because youth jails have run out of cells, with governors under urgent orders to trawl their prisons to find young offenders suitable for early release, or transfer to children’s homes.

Now ministers could be forced to take similar steps in adult jails to avoid newly-sentenced criminals arriving from courtrooms being turned away.

Why am I not surprised? And does “turned away” mean “turned back out on the street”?

At least 40 convicts have already spent the night in police cells in the West Midlands because no room could be found for them in local jails.

The crisis means courts are likely to come under even more pressure not to hand out prison sentences to criminals, but to use supposedly tough community punishments for more and more offenders.

Or you could just hand them “ASBOs” and let them go on their merry way! Aren’t those “supposedly tough”?

A Home Office spokeswoman said officials were ‘concerned’ and were watching the situation closely.

“Watching the situation closely” via closed-circuit television, I’m sure.

Capacity is expected to rise slightly in the autumn as a small number of prison wings are reopened following refurbishment work, but that could come too late to avoid the current crisis.

Prison campaigners claim overcrowding prevents jails from carrying out vital rehabilitation work with offenders to steer them away from criminal careers, and have accused ministers of complacency over the issue.

Perhaps you might consider the fact that “rehabilitation” isn’t actually accomplished, and that the resources spent on it might be better applied elsewhere? (And in poli-speak, “complacency” means “You’re not spending enough money on my pet project, bub!”)

Even the traditionally quiet summer months when many courts are closed have not halted the relentless rise in the jail population, which has soared by some 2,300 over the past year alone.

Housing offenders in police cells costs £362 ($685) per night – more than many top hotels – compared with £66 ($125) per night in a prison.

Maybe we should introduce the British to Sheriff Joe Arpaio? Tent cities, pink underwear, and bologna sandwiches have to cost less than a night at the Radisson, much less one in the Presidential Suite at a Hilton.

The extreme option if the crisis-point is reached is administrative release, where the Home Secretary can order offenders close to the end of their sentence to be freed.

“Close to the end” being a somewhat flexible measurement, I’m sure. Meanwhile, reality rears its ugly head on a different topic:

Council tax ‘must soar to plug hole in public pensions’

By MATTHEW HICKLEY
21:46pm 11th August 2006

Council tax bills will have to rocket to plug the Government’s black hole in public sector pensions, the head of the spending watchdog has warned.

Remember, “There is no Social Security crisis.”

Steve Bundred, chief executive of the Audit Commission, says local taxpayers will be forced to foot the bill after ministers caved in to union pressure to allow town hall staff to continue retiring early on gold-plated pensions.

The U-turn provoked fury as ministers had pledged that public sector workers would have to retire at the same age as the private sector. Local government pensions already cost the taxpayer a staggering £3billion ($5.67 billion) a year.

Under Labour, the annual local government wage bill before pension costs – excluding police, teachers or firefighters – has soared from £11billion to £18billion ($20.8 to $34 billion) and now costs around £845 ($1,600) per household.

That’s per year.

Mr Bundred has written to Ruth Kelly, the secretary of state for communities and local government, calling for the local government pensions scheme to be overhauled.

He said: ‘At some unspecified date in the future, someone will have to start bailing out the funds. That someone is most likely to be the local taxpayer.’

Uh, excuse me – who else would it be?

He went on to warn that there was an ‘accountability gap’ in public sector pensions. ‘Taxpayers, and members of the scheme, are entitled to a greater degree of assurance that the funds offer value for money,’ he said. ‘What is needed is far more openness and transparency.’

Not “lower, later benefits”?

Mr Bundred added: ‘The accountability arrangements for the Local Government Pension Scheme do not match its scale. What passed as fit for purpose historically is now inadequate as liabilities have grown thanks to increasing life spans and higher salaries.

‘Particularly lacking is accountability about performance to the taxpayer and to the employees making contributions.’

Local government is one of the UK’s biggest employers with 3.2million on the payroll and has an asset value of nearly £90billion, making it the world’s fourth largest pension fund.

Strike threat

Last year, ministers backed down in the face of strike action by local government workers by allowing existing employees to continue retiring early on inflation-proofed final salary pensions.

Under existing rules, they can retire with a full pensions if their age plus their length of service totals 85 years, and has led to the average retirement age for a council workers falling to 58.

Campaigners have warned that private sector employees are being forced to pick up the bill so that their public sector counterparts can enjoy pensions rights which they do not enjoy.

Those in the private sector have been told they will have to work until 68.

Can you imagine the howls here when we’re told that Social Security won’t start paying out until we hit 68?

Experts have warned that the total black hole in public sector pensions is currently £530billion (a hair over $1 trillion), making it a huge burden for future generations of taxpayers.

Ah, the British, and their flair for stiff-upper-lip understatement!

The Tories said that the black hole in local government pensions alone is worth around £32billion ($60.5 billion).

Local government spokesman Caroline Spelman said: ‘This year Labour has hiked the council tax bills of pensioners by £250 ($472).

‘Since 1997, one third of the basic state pension has been grabbed back in everincreasing council tax. Pensioners are being jailed for non-payment, while violent criminals roam the streets freely.

See the piece immediately above (written by the same reporter, no less!) No wonder the prisons are overcrowded! You have to wonder about the economics of locking up pensioners at $125 a night for non-payment of taxes, don’t you? Or do they get the Presidential Suites?

“Yet the Labour Government is adding insult to injury by making hardworking families pay towards the cost of goldplated town hall pensions.

And you expected a different outcome… why?

‘Council taxpayers simply cannot afford to foot the growing bill. At a time when some private sector workers face having to work until 68, this is neither sustainable nor fair.”

I quote:

The EU is built on a fantasy–that men and women can do less and less work, have longer and longer holidays and retire at an earlier age, while having their income, in real terms, and their standard of living increase. And this miracle is to be brought about by the enlightened bureaucratic regulation of every aspect of life.

Paul Johnson, 10.06.03 Forbes Magazine “Europe’s Utopian Hangover”

It may be that England gets to be first to wake up to the facts, but at this point I’m thinking they’re going to sleep through the lesson.

James Frayne, campaign director of the Taxpayers’ Alliance, added: ‘Local people have only just been warned that they may have to foot the bill for an increase in the number of migrants coming to Britain, so they will be alarmed that they also face the prospect of having to pay for local government pension schemes.

‘The Government has got to understand that people are already struggling to make ends meet and they can’t keep being used as a convenient cash resource.’

Sure they can. Who’s going to stop them?

I mean, until the goose that lays the gold-plated pension eggs lies dead that is.

KevinLeave a comment

Another “Gullible Gunner”?

Long-time readers know about the months-long exchange between me and Australian blogger Tim Lambert over the topic of self-defense in the UK. His position is that self-defense is perfectly legal – though there might be a bit of a “chilling effect” on its practice – due, he says, to “gullible gunners” like me who blow news stories out of proportion. My position is that self-defense is legally on the books, but any citizen who actually tries it puts his freedom and fortune into the hands of the Law because the Crown Prosecution Service will most probably charge that citizen for violating some statute or six.

Case in point (h/t KeepandBearArms.com), 64 year-old Diane Bond:

Brave grandma arrested after standing up to yobs

By IAN DRURY, Daily Mail
22:00pm 4th August 2006

After months of being taunted by a gang of yobs, grandmother Diane Bond finally stood up to them when she was abused while walking her pet dog. During a torrent of foul-mouthed abuse, the frail 64-year-old prodded the teenager ringleader gently in the stomach when he urged her to “Hit me, if you dare”.

Obviously the teenaged “yob” doesn’t fear the law much.

Moments later, the 5ft 1ins pensioner found herself flat on her back and nursing a broken arm after the 15-year-old boy, who was 7 inches taller, pushed her to the ground. But to add insult to injury, police officers arrested her for assaulting a child after his mother moaned he had been attacked.

And there’s another reason for his behavior.

Now Mrs Bond must report to a police station 30 miles from her home in Llandrindod Wells, Powys, Wales, at the end of the month to find out if she will be charged. Last night the retired lab technician spoke of her distress. “I am in shock and very, very teary,” she said.

“I have never been in any trouble before. I just want to enjoy my evenings walking my dog in peace. I am being treated like a criminal because a gang of yobs have nothing better to do than pick on an old lady.”

Buck up, Mrs. Bond. You’re not alone!*

Residents of her quiet street have complained to the police and council for several months about youths causing anti-social behaviour. In the latest letter to Powys County Council in June, residents said they had suffered an “endless stream” of damage to property and cars, intimidation, vandalism, noise and rubbish being hurled into gardens by up to 30 youths aged 11 to 17.

Well, I’m sure the local constabulary has handed out a number of ASBOs – “Anti-social behavior orders” – to the misguided yoots. What else can they do?

Signed by 35 fed-up people, it added: “Collectively, we are sick and tired of the situation and our frustration is now close to boiling over.”

They’d best be careful! That kind of wording could be considered a threat of premeditated assault!

Things finally came to a head when Mrs Bond, who has two children and five grandchildren, took her terrier Hettie for a walk on parkland near her home. She said a group of about 20 teenagers were loitering on the grass. Three others were standing on a path, deliberately blocking her way.

“As I approached they started shouting abuse at me,” she said. “They were taunting me and crowding round me and I was quite frightened because they are big kids.

“After a while one of them, whose name is Billy, spread his arms out wide to show his stomach, and said, Come on, old lady, hit me, if you dare.”

“I gave him three prods, almost like playful punches, not hard at all, and next thing I knew I was lying on the ground and I had broken my arm. One youth said I had been pushed.

“I went back home, shaking and crying.”

Yet she was the one arrested (since, being a law-abiding citizen, she wouldn’t resist and probably doesn’t even know a lawyer, much less retain one…)

Soon after, two police officers knocked on Mrs Bond’s door and arrested her on suspicion of assaulting a minor. “It seemed the lad had told his mum what had happened and she had immediately lodged a complaint of assault,” she said.

Mrs Bond, who lives alone, was cautioned and interviewed for nearly three hours by police officers before she was released on bail at about 1.30am.

Let’s do the math: Carry the one… They arrested her at about 10:30 PM! It couldn’t wait until the following morning? She was going to skip the country overnight to avoid prosecution? And bail? I’m curious as to just how much this flight-risk had to shell out to get out of the slammer!

She has now made a counter-allegation to the police of assault against the youth. But she added: “This sends out the message that if you stand up for yourself, if you try to take action to stop anti-social behaviour, you are likely to end up being arrested.”

Yes. That’s EXACTLY what it does. And it’s meant to. And that’s the point I’ve been making all along.

Earlier this year, Prime Minister Tony Blair said communities had to stand up to yobs in the fight against nuisance behaviour. Mrs Bond’s neighbour Steve Simmons, who co-ordinates the Nelson Street – An End To Anti-Social Behaviour campaign group, said: “Diane is a reasonable law-abiding citizen and she has been treated like a criminal for standing up to yobs when the authorities would not.

“It is bewildering. The Government says communities should look after themselves and take a stance against anti-social behaviour. But when we do try to take action, what is the first thing that happens? The blame is put on us.”

Noticed that, did you? Once the government has seized the monopoly on the legitimate use of force, it will not surrender that monopoly willingly. What’s bewildering about that?

In May, grandmother Brenda Robinson, 66, of Bournemouth, spent a night in a police cell after being arrested for alleged assault when she gave a rowdy youth a “clip round the ear”.

That used to be known as “administering disclipline,” but no longer. Add Mrs. Robinson to the list, then. She’s in good company, too.

She acted after being abused, pushed and threatened with a plank of wood. Roger Williams, Liberal Democrat MP for Brecon and Radnorshire, said: “I would have expected the police to have acted slightly more proportionately than arresting Mrs Bond over this.

“It must have been a frightening situation for an elderly lady to be confronted by a gang of yobs, especially in an area with a history of anti-social behaviour, without the police compounding the problem.”

Gee, ya THINK?

Chief Inspector Steve Hughson, of Dyfed-Powys Police, said: “We are aware of the problems in Nelson Street and associated anti-social behaviour.

“Recent patrols in the area by the neighbourhood policing team have greatly reduced incidents of crime and anti social behaviour, to the extent that positive comments have been received by local residents.

If you interpret “About bloody time!” as a “positive comment.”

“Therefore patrols will continue.”

Until the media pressure is off.

The force declined to comment on Mrs Bond’s arrest.

I bet they did.

*Mrs. Bond is in the company of fine people like Mrs. Robinson, mentioned above, and also:

Maureen Jennings, 50, of Manchester.

Martin James, 64, late of Birmingham.

Bill Clifford, 77, late of Hampshire.

David Benton, 44, of Moorby

Linda Walker, 47, of Greater Manchester

Yes, they’re all just “gullible gunners” like me.

It’s Not Much, but Nerf™land Pushes Back

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A couple of weeks ago I wrote about schools in England that were banning the paper airplane because of fears of student injury, another school that had removed its swingset because it “faced the sun” and they were concerned about kids blinding themselves, and other similar idiocy.

Well, it looks like somebody over there has had enough, and they’re not alone. Wendy McElroy, proprietor of ifeminist.com and a Fox News columnist, has written a piece about a book recently published there:

New Book Revives Lost Notions of Boyhood

The Dangerous Book for Boys by the British brothers Conn and Hal Iggulden is a practical manual that returns boys to the wonder and almost lost world of tree houses and pirate flags. It celebrates the art of teaching an old mutt new tricks and accepts skinned knees as an acceptable risk for running through fields with the same dog yapping along.

As of July 3, The Dangerous Book is the number one seller on Amazon UK and it is holding steady at about 7,000 on Amazon in the U.S., where it was published on June 5. The Australian News reports that the book “has made it to the top five of…Amazon [Australia], after just a week.”

Those results make publishers take notice. But social commentators are also reacting with both applause and condemnation.

Condemnation arises because The Dangerous Book breaks the dominant and politically correct stereotype for children’s books. It presents boys as being deeply different than girls in terms of their interests and pursuits. Although it is highly probable that bookstores will sell the book to girls who then will go on to practice skimming stones, nevertheless the genders are separated within the book’s pages.

Read the whole thing. Wendy isn’t your typical feminist.

An interesting note, Clayton Cramer (not a fan of Amazon.com) reports that Amazon here in the U.S. no longer lists The Dangerous Book for Boys on its website. The excuse is beyond lame.

Other media sources have responded to The Dangerous Book, for example this op-ed from the The Sunday Times, June 17:

Every so often the lofty minarets of publishing find themselves shaken by a seismic crack from down below. The sound — deeply liberating in the age of the pre-digested blockbuster — is that of the book-buying public spontaneously making its presence felt: one of those infrequent but hugely intriguing instances of word-of-mouth buzz picking up on some hitherto under-publicised item and sending it storming up the bestseller list without the people who administer the book trade really noticing.

The latest example of this encouraging trend is a work entitled The Dangerous Book For Boys by the brothers Conn and Hal Iggulden — Conn is a well-known historical novelist — which was overlooked by the literary editors and the three-for-two promotions but is currently number one on the Amazon chart.

Undoubtedly it is being bought not only by boys but by their fathers as a splendidly politically incorrect guide to both boyhood and fatherhood.

Got up in gilt and scarlet covers, stoutly hardbacked and looking for all the world like a juvenile Christmas present from around the time of King Edward VII’s coronation, The Dangerous Book For Boys declares its intent from the opening page.

“In this age of video games and mobile phones there must still be a place for knots, tree houses and stories of incredible courage,” the authors maintain. “Men and boys today are the same as they always were, and interested in the same things . . . We hope in years to come that this will be a book to dig out of the attic and give to a couple of kids staring at a pile of wood and wondering what to do with it.”

I liked this part particularly:

Clearly, over the next few months The Dangerous Book For Boys, however misleading the promise of its title, is set to play a bumper role in Taylor family life.

Behind its success lurk some shrewd cultural deductions that, here in the bright dawn of the technology-driven 21st century, hardly ever occur to people down at the sharp end of the child-rearing process.

The most obvious is the absolute feebleness of what gets taught in schools these days.

Unsurprisingly:

The drawback to the Iggulden project, of course, is that it is completely opposed to practically every development (and developer) currently at work in the British educational process. Not many modern curriculums, after all, feature lists of British kings and queens, troop deployments at Balaclava and the nature of the pluperfect tense.

On the practical side, it goes without saying that the average headmaster would probably have a fit if anyone suggested that his male pupils ought, for the purpose of drawing them closer to their fathers, be taught how to gut a rabbit.

He (or she) would probably be deeply disturbed, too, by the sight of the Oxford historian Niall Ferguson — quoted by the Igguldens — summarising the achievements of the British Empire (downsides are mentioned too) or a list of recommended reading that includes the original James Bond books and the Flashman novels of George MacDonald Fraser.

Even Al-Guardian can’t be too negative about the book:

The book is beautifully accomplished, from its instructions about hunting and cooking a rabbit to its diagrams explaining how to wrap a parcel in brown paper and string. (“Not a very ‘dangerous’ activity, it’s true, but … extremely satisfying.”) But does the chord it has struck also reveal the stubborn prevalence of some rather foolish and deluded fantasy vision of British boyhood? Of a past less noble and less real than it may seem in hindsight, a past which those books and comics that inspired this one would have us believe?

I suppose the answer is mostly yes. I’m old enough to have grown up in a time when the sorts of virtues championed here – wholesome curiosity, diligent teamwork, pluck and decency – still enjoyed some currency, especially in schools and in the cub scouts. However, while boys of my generation enjoyed a freedom to roam and to construct bows and arrows and to play football until dusk, those good-egg moral virtues were often scarce in reality. Boys who were not “hard” or sporty got picked on by boys who were, just as happens now. Bob Cherry, the brave and hearty hero from the Billy Bunter series, was very much a fictional character.

Is this book, then, purely romantic? That’s quite a tricky one to call. I’m wondering why it is called “dangerous”. Does the choice of adjective simply express that hankering after a time when parents were less fearful about their children? Or is it some sort of a comment being made to the effect that it is dangerous these days to insist that boys are totally different creatures from girls? A chapter called The British Empire (1497-1997) repays careful rereading. It’s all battles and rebellions and good intentions that didn’t always work out, but were still good intentions anyway. It is hard to see this as anything other than a conservative reading of the imperial centuries, which makes me inclined to see The Dangerous Book for Boys and its popularity as of a piece with a modern lament about the loss of an old gender order under which a chap knew what a chap was meant to do and the world was a happier place.

I don’t believe it ever was that simple, and pining for it will do none of us much good. Yet there remains much that is admirable here. Some more advice from Sir Frederick Treves: “Don’t swagger. The boy who swaggers – like a man who swaggers – has little else that he can do … It is the empty tin that rattles most. Be honest. Be loyal. Be kind. Remember that the hardest thing to acquire is the faculty of being unselfish. As a quality it is one of the finest attributes of manliness.” Not much to quarrel with there.

The June 13 Telegraph story on the book is equally interesting. Note the opening:

A book of old-fashioned, adventurous pastimes for lads and dads has become a surprise bestseller. Christopher Middleton watched his 11-year-old son transformed into a Middle Earth warrior

It’s amazing that The Dangerous Book For Boys ever got published, really, given the deeply unfashionable connotations surrounding two out of the five words in the title (the ones that aren’t “The”, “Book” and “For”).

The very thought of an educational volume that sets out both to exclude a specific gender and to promote activities with questionable health and safety implications is enough to bring the ultimate condemnation that the world of mealy-mouthdom has to offer – that of being “inappropriate”.

It’s not like Political Correctness is going unnoticed in England, as natural as breathing air. They’re apparently choking on it, too.

Is this a backlash against Political Correctness? Undoubtedly. Does it signal the beginning of a popular movement against it? I doubt, but I can hope. British doctor and writer Theodore Dalrymple, author of several books and numerous essays on the decline of British society, said this in an interview with FrontPage magazine after the publication of his book Our Culture, What’s Left of it: The Mandarins and the Masses:

Political correctness is communist propaganda writ small. In my study of communist societies, I came to the conclusion that the purpose of communist propaganda was not to persuade or convince, nor to inform, but to humiliate; and therefore, the less it corresponded to reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is to co-operate with evil, and in some small way to become evil oneself. One’s standing to resist anything is thus eroded, and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control. I think if you examine political correctness, it has the same effect and is intended to.

And I think he’s absolutely correct.

It’s past time for a backlash against it, both here and most especially in England. The Dangerous Book for Boys isn’t much, but it’s a start, and it’s aimed at exactly the right target.

KevinLeave a comment

That’s Not Risk-Aversion, it’s Risk-PHOBIA.

Back in 2005 I wrote More Moronics from Nerf™land – I Mean England, about a recommendation by a group of doctors who wanted the government to ban kitchen knives because – and I quote:

Doctors claim long kitchen knives serve no purpose except as weapons

I noted that, were it me, I wouldn’t be giving up my 10″ Henckel’s Chef’s knife any time soon. In the same piece I also reported on the effort to get pubs to use plastic pint glasses and plastic beer bottles because – again I quote:

Pub fights ‘cost £4m a year.’

In that piece I advised:

I’ll tell you what: Let’s just raze the British Isles, tote off all of the wood and brick and glass and metal and rebuild with terrycloth, foam rubber, Saran-wrap and soft plastics and then you’ll all be safe! Right?

As soon as everyone is in a straightjacket, that is. You seem to need the spinal support.

I thought I was being facetious. Apparently not:

Now pupils are banned from throwing paper planes

Pupils have been banned from throwing paper planes to one another – in case they get injured.

Staff at a primary school have instead set up special targets in the playground for the children to aim at.

The edict follows claims by teachers that a few of the school’s pupils, aged between three and 11, had been ‘over-zealous’ in launching the missiles.

The headteacher argued the ban was ‘a sensible’ measure – but parents of some of the 230 pupils reacted with disbelief.

Coming in the wake of high-profile bans around the country on traditional playground games such as tag and conkers, they fear aversion to risk is denying their children the learning experience they enjoyed.

One father of a seven-year-old boy said: ‘I’ve heard it all now. We made paper planes and our parents did the same and I never heard of anyone getting hurt.

‘It’s taking the health-and-safety measures to absurd lengths. Heaven knows what they will think to ban next.’

Staff at Bishops Down Primary School in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, introduced the ban earlier this month after two pupils were seen aiming their paper planes at other children.

The youngsters are still allowed to make the darts but are being supervised to ensure they only launch them at the targets.

Headteacher Emma Savage sai staff were particularly concerned about eye injuries.

‘These planes can have sharp edges and have the potential to damage a young person’s eyes,’ she said.

You’ll put your eye out!

‘We have stopped pupils from aiming them at other children’s eyes, which would seem like a reasonable thing to do.

You’ve flown paper airplanes before. They’re not exactly yard-darts. Can anybody accurately hit a moving target with a paper airplane? Especially one with a 15mm bullseye? (Pun intended.)

‘But they can still make and throw planes as much as they want because we have a safe area with targets in the playground.

‘The measure was taken because some of the children were getting a bit over-zealous.’

Mrs Savage claimed no one had complained about the ban.

Paper planes have been a feature of playgrounds since the turn of the last century, although the Chinese were making paper kites 2,000 years ago. And Leonardo da Vinci created parchment planes after sketching early designs for flying machines.

The art of making paper planes is taken seriously enough for an entry to be registered by Guinness World Records.

American enthusiast Ken Blackburn holds the record for achieving flight time of 27.6 seconds in 1998.

A spokeswoman for Kent Council said schools were free to enforce their own safety measures but added.

‘I have never heard of any restrictions being imposed on paper planes before.’

It is the latest in a string of playground safety clampdowns.

Staff at Broomley First School in Stocksfield, Northumberland, ordered children to stop playing tag because it was ‘too rough’. Many schools have banned conkers forcing pupils to wear goggles while playing – because they fear they could be used as ‘offensive weapons’.

And a Gloucestershire village had to remove swings because they faced the sun and there was concern users could be blinded.

Sweet. Bleeding. Jeebus. I guess even they figured out that banning the sun wasn’t going to work.

A survey of 500 youngsters by The Children’s Society charity found the majority believe playgrounds are boring. Forty-five per cent said they had been stopped from playing with water and a third from climbing trees.

It really is Nerf™land!

Some comments from the article:

Has anyone checked that the cotton wool, the kids are wrapped up in these days, is not allergic to them…?

– Pete, Colchester, Essex

There are way too many laws, rules, regulations and prohibitions in this country now in an effort to make life failsafe. Life’s not like that, and any intelligent person will merely ignore this nonsense.

– Nigel Smith, London

But you can’t ignore it, Nigel. The State will come enforce itself on you if you try.

What can anyone say? Words completely fail me – except to say the people who decide on these rules are completely barking mad.

– Carolyn, Isle of Man

But Carolyn, the “completely barking mad” are in charge of the education of your children.

Balls can be thrown so why not ban those… skipping ropes could be used to hang children and god forbid that they should carry sharp pencils or even worse umbrellas.

These sad, sad people who think up such rubbish must have had a sad, sad childhood themselves.
Let the children laugh to remind us of ourselves and let them grow with a strength and determination to succeed. Allow them to have a competitive spirit and the will to go forward. Let them rejoice in the thrill of winning and the fear of chance.

Wrap them in cotton wool and we will be breeding a generation of losers and whiners.

– Alan, Weston Super Mare

Err, Alan, which generation is it, do you think, that’s proposing these bans?

I’ve got two quotes to add to this. One is very old:

All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth. – Aristotle

The other I’ve repeated here often:

The other day our Carpenter’s helper heard me say something along the lines of, “it is difficult to conclude that incompetence is the reason why our public schools have deteriorated. There comes a point where you have to suspect sabotage, or a conspiracy.”

He asked me if I really meant that. I gave him the five minute explanation of John Dewey’s known affiliation with communists, his frequent essays and articles about the wonders of the Soviet education system, and his quote, “You can’t make Socialists out of individualists. Children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society which is coming where everyone is interdependent.”

I then went on to tell him about how public schools changed at the turn of the last century. That there were others involved in turning Americans from free-thinking individualists to factory drones. I also added that many people probably went along with it because it seemed like a good idea, but there were certainly enough people behind the scenes, who knew that the goal posts had been moved. THAT is a conspiracy.

Yes. There does come that time when you are forced to don the tinfoil hat.

The incompetence excuse only works once. Incompetence this great is impossible to attribute to accident.

That one’s by Connie du Toit.

Yup. I’m convinced this kind of thing is deliberate, and for precisely the reason Aristotle noted.

Intelligent, active, healthy, educated children make poor drones when they grow up.

KevinLeave a comment

And We Thought the Kelo Decision Was Bad!.

Homes of the dead to be seized

Bereaved families could have the homes of dead relatives seized under new laws that allow the state to commandeer empty properties.

Local councils will be able to take control of inherited homes if they are left vacant for more than six months.

After that time the beneficiaries of a will risk seeing the house that has been left to them taken over and rented out as social housing.

The new rules, which could affect 250,000 homes in England, will come into force next month, according to details slipped out by Communities Secretary Ruth Kelly.

They state that those who leave a house or flat empty for six months risk losing control of it to the local council, which will have power to break in, alter or refurbish it, and let it out to tenants of the authority’s choice. The greatest impact is likely to fall on bereaved families.

Although actual ownership will remain with the family, the new law means that the home of a relative who has died may be taken over by the council just six months after the will has been put into effect.

Many families are likely to be debating how to deal with or share out the value of the home of a loved one for several months after a death. The risk of losing family property comes on top of the growing burden of inheritance tax and the highly controversial ‘means test’ system for long-term care of the elderly.

Tory housing spokesman Michael Gove said yesterday: “Seizing homes of the recently deceased is particularly disturbing. I doubt that state officials will always recognise the delays that can result from complex wills or appreciate the traumatic ordeal that families face with the task of clearing a home of personal possessions.” He added: “I fear this is a stealthy new form of inheritance tax.”

Housing experts called the confiscation of property ‘outrageous’. Robert Whelan of the Civitas think-tank said: “This runs right against the ancient common law principle of private property, which is as fundamental as habeas corpus.

“The right to private property is the Englishman’s right to his castle. This looks to me like the point where Labour has overstepped the mark into behaving more like a dictatorship than a democratic government.”

Mr Whelan added: “I think anybody whose property is seized under this law should go straight to court to see if a judge thinks it should stand.”

Henry Stuart, head of property at the City law firm Withers, said: “Many families decide to sell inherited property – but they often wait for the right time. For example, you do not sell a country cottage in November, you wait until the spring. But by then the local council could have put a tenant in.”

The right for councils to impose ‘Empty Dwelling Management Orders’ was included in a 2004 Housing Act pushed through by Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott.

Miss Kelly, his successor in charge of housing policy, published guidance on how the orders will work last Friday afternoon, without informing MPs or the media.

When the law was pushed through Parliament, it was said that target homes would be in crime-affected streets in inner cities. However, the details now made public show that the orders will apply to any home. The guidance on the new powers said: “The property does not have to be run down or uninhabitable. The fact it has not been lived in for more than six months may be enough to allow an EDMO to be made.”

Exceptions cover second and holiday homes and homes of those working ‘temporarily’ away. In the case of inherited property, exemption applies for six months after grant of probate. An EDMO can last for seven years, but owners can apply to get their house back earlier. No home can be seized if its owner can show it is ‘genuinely’ on the market.

The seizure of homes must also be approved by a Residential Property Tribunal. These are the panels that have until now been confined to settling disputes between private landlords and tenants.

Those who are the first to lose control of property to a council may also challenge the new law in the courts through the process of judicial review.

A spokesman for Miss Kelly’s department said: “The owner retains ownership rights and can dispose of their dwelling at any time or seek revocation of an order to enable sale or to otherwise secure occupation.”

Yes, England slides further towards bondage.

And the populace increasingly avoids involving itself in fighting crime, since the State has made it plain that they’re not qualified and will be punished for doing the State’s job:

Pensioner brutally attacked at seafront – yet no one came to his aid

When pensioner Derek Gull was targeted by two vicious muggers he was not walking through a tough housing estate or along some dark alley.

The 76-year-old was sitting on a bench in broad daylight on a busy sea front.

But as the thugs smashed a brick into his face and broke both his wrists as they tried to wrench his watch off his arm, not a single person stepped in to help.

The grandfather told yesterday how more than a dozen people carried on walking as he struggled against his attackers with blood streaming down his face.

He fought bravely to stop them taking the watch – which was a present from his wife on their golden wedding anniversary – and they eventually fled after pushing him down an 8ft embankment.

And as he staggered through the town covered in blood, still no-one stopped to help.

“I couldn’t see properly because my eyes were watering,” Mr Gull said yesterday as he recovered from his injuries at home.

“I was covered with blood from my nose. At least a dozen people walked past and did not bother to do anything, they just ignored me.

“It’s disgusting, my whole family is upset about it. I suppose people just don’t want to get involved any more, they don’t seem to care.

“But if I saw someone like that I would see if I could help, I wouldn’t just walk past and ignore it.”

Mr Gull’s ordeal earlier this month came just days after motorists ignored a girl of eight as she dragged herself to the pavement with a broken leg after being mowed down by a hit and run driver.

Cait Atkins was walking near her home in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, when she was run over. Up to 12 motorists drove past her without stopping to help.

Mr Gull, a retired electrician from Rainham, Essex, had been visiting Clacton-on-Sea on a day trip with his local working men’s club.

During the day, he separated from the others to visit a friend at the town’s bowling club.

As he walked back to meet the rest of the group in a restaurant he decided to sit on a bench for a while and watch some youngsters playing football on the beach.

“Suddenly I felt an arm come round from behind and grab me and a voice demanded that I hand over my watch,” the father of three said.

‘He would have had to kill me for the watch’

“It was a golden wedding anniversary present from my wife so he would have had to kill me to get it.

“Another arm came round and started tugging at the watch and trying to get it off. I clenched my fist so he couldn’t get it off me.

“Then he pulled my arm through the slats and twisted it until it broke.

“I heard him say to someone else “hit him” and the next thing I knew half a brick hit me in the face breaking my nose.

“There was blood everywhere and my eyes were watering, I couldn’t see a thing.”

Mr Gull, who is registered disabled as he suffers from curvature of the spine, managed to struggle to his feet and his attackers – aged in their late teens – pushed him down an 8ft bank onto a concrete path before fleeing.

“I got my faculties together and tried to make my way back to the restaurant but I was covered in blood and it was pouring out of my nose.

“I couldn’t see a thing because my eyes were watering so much.

“I must have passed about half a dozen people but no one asked me what had happened or offered to help me.

“At the time I was so upset that people just ignored me but looking back I suppose they just didn’t want to get involved or maybe they thought I was a drunk.

“If it was me though, I would have gone out of my way to help someone in that situation.”

Eventually Mr Gull met some members of his group who guided him back to the restaurant where he was cleaned up and the police were called.

After showing them where the incident took place he insisted on taking the hour and a half long journey back to Rainham with the working men’s club on the coach.

It was only when he got home that he agreed to go to hospital where he collapsed in casualty.

Doctors were so concerned about the amount of blood he had swallowed that they gave him a lung scan and he was kept in hospital for more than a week before being allowed back home on Wednesday. He is unable to drive his car or play his regular game of bowls.

Mr Gull, who served in the Army for two and a half years after joining in 1947, suggested bringing back national service to deal with antisocial youths.

“That would sort out all the young thugs of today. Like the old saying goes, you go in as a boy and come out as a man.”

Mr Gull’s 75-year-old wife, Violet, said she was pleased that her husband clung on the the gold Ellesse watch she had bought him.

She added: “He was very brave, but it’s disgusting that no-one helped him.

“I don’t know what the world is coming to.”

Essex Police are appealing for witnesses.

What’s the world coming to? Well, apparently it’s coming to shit.

Damn, it pains me to see what the Mother Country has become.

KevinLeave a comment

On England’s Continued Decline.

Read Theodore Dalrymple’s latest City Journal column, “It’s This Bad,” and try to convince yourself that what he describes is not coming here if the Left ever acquires control of the levers of power. Excerpts:

Returning briefly to England from France for a speaking engagement, I bought three of the major dailies to catch up on the latest developments in my native land. The impression they gave was of a country in the grip of a thoroughgoing moral frivolity. In a strange inversion of proper priorities, important matters are taken lightly and trivial ones taken seriously.

This is not the charming or uplifting frivolity of Feydeau’s farces or Oscar Wilde’s comedies; it is the frivolity of real decadence, bespeaking a profound failure of nerve bound to have disastrous consequences for the country’s quality of life. The newspapers portrayed frivolity without gaiety and earnestness without seriousness—a most unattractive combination.

—

The newspapers confirmed what I had long perceived before I left Britain: that the zeitgeist of the country is now one of sentimental moralizing combined with the utmost cynicism, where the government’s pretended concern for the public welfare coexists with the most elementary dereliction of duty. There is an absence of any kind of idealism that is a necessary precondition of probity, so that bad faith prevails almost everywhere. The government sees itself as an engineer of souls (to use the phrase so eloquently coined by Stalin with regard to writers who, of course, were expected to mold Homo Sovieticus by the power of their words). Government thus concerns itself with what people think, feel, and say—as well as with trying to change their freely chosen habits—rather than with performing its one inescapable duty: that of preserving the peace and ensuring that citizens may go about their lawful business in confidence and safety.

Read. Every. Damned. Word.

I am reminded once again of Kim du Toit’s explanation of why he and I and others comment on Albion’s decline:

(W)e Americans can’t help but be horribly fascinated by what’s happening to our British cousins.

I’m serious about this. The slight disturbances in the late 1770s and early 1810s notwithstanding, we Americans have always held our British cousins in the greatest esteem. No, that’s not strong enough. We love Britain, as much for our shared heritage and language as for the fact that when we’re traveling, it’s an enormous relief not to have to struggle with a map and a language guide.

—

I could fill these pages with news of similar atrocities happening anywhere in the world—the British Disease is by no means confined to Britain, as witnessed by car-burning being the recreational favorite of French teenagers—but, if I may be frank, I don’t give a rat’s ass what happens to France, to the French, or to any other country in the world for that matter.

But I care, deeply, about what’s happening in Britain nowadays, and if it seems any other way to my Brit Friends and Readers, then I humbly beg your forgiveness.

Dalrymple says much the same:

Therefore I have removed myself: not that I imagine things are much better, only slightly different, in France. But one does not feel the defects of a foreign country in quite the same lacerating way as the defects of one’s native land; they are more an object of amused, detached interest than of personal despair.

If You Want More of Something, Subsidize It

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The UK’s Home Office, the department of the British state responsible for keeping track of various government statistics, reports triumphantly that burglary is down in England & Wales by 20% from the previous year, and is now half of what it was in 1995! Just look!

Our target is to reduce domestic burglary between 1999 and 2005/06 by 25%, and we are pursuing various means to achieve this.

Working together

Working together is essential to combat burglary, and we have worked in partnership with companies target burglary prevention messages at specific groups such as people moving house, students, older people and holiday makers.

Tougher sentencing

This approach has gone hand-in-hand with other initiatives such as tougher sentencing. We have introduced a minimum sentence of at least three years for people convicted of burglary on three separate occasions.

Coded for keeps

We’re also working to make it harder, riskier and less profitable for thieves to use or dispose of stolen goods. This includes several elements such as tackling handlers and other outlets for stolen goods and trying to get industry to produce (and the public to buy) more secure products.

You can help by marking your property with your postcode, and by not buying property you think might be stolen – it’s not just an offence (punishable by up to 14 years in prison) but it encourages thieves and funds drug habits.

Keeping burglary down

Burglary rates are dropping, and we want this to continue. You can help by making sure you do everything possible to secure your property, as you’re much less likely to be a victim of burglary if you have security measures in place in your home.

For example, the Crime in England and Wales 2004/2005 report found that while 83% of the general public had window locks, only 36% of burglary victims did. This strongly indicates that the more secure your property, the less likely it is you will be burgled.

Meaning, of course, that it’s your own damned fault for not chaining everything you own down with titanium chain. But! Things have improved!

Not for freaking long, though.

David Hardy provides the link to this Daily Mail story:

‘Let burglars off with caution’, police told

Burglars will be allowed to escape without punishment under new instructions sent to all police forces. Police have been told they can let them off the threat of a court appearance and instead allow them to go with a caution.

The same leniency will be shown to criminals responsible for more than 60 other different offences, ranging from arson through vandalism to sex with underage girls.

New rules sent to police chiefs by the Home Office set out how seriously various crimes should be regarded, and when offenders who admit to them should be sent home with a caution.

A caution counts as a criminal record but means the offender does not face a court appearance which would be likely to end in a fine, a community punishment or jail.

But that’s not all!

Some serious offences – including burglary of a shop or office, threatening to kill, actual bodily harm, and possession of Class A drugs such as heroin or cocaine – may now be dealt with by caution if police decide that would be the best approach.

And a string of crimes including common assault, threatening behaviour, sex with an underage girl or boy, and taking a car without its owner’s consent, should normally be dealt with by a caution, the circular said.

The Home Office instruction applies to offenders who have admitted their guilt but who have no criminal record.

They are also likely to be able to show mitigating factors to lessen the seriousness of their crime.

And what is the reason behind all of this?

The instruction to abandon court prosecutions in more cases – even for people who admit to having carried out serious crimes – comes in the wake of repeated attempts by ministers and senior judges to persuade the courts to send fewer criminals to jail.

The crisis of overcrowding in UK prisons has also prompted moves to let many more convicts out earlier.

It emerged last month that some violent or sex offenders, given mandatory life sentences under a “two-strike” rule, have been freed after as little as 15 months.

Wow! Fifteen month “life sentences!”

Did it not occur to anyone that, just possibly, the reason crime rates were going down was because the criminals were in jail and couldn’t commit crimes against the public in there?

I suppose not.

The latest move provoked condemnation yesterday from Tories and critics of the justice system.

Shadow Home Secretary David Davis said: “Yet again the Government is covertly undermining the penal system and throwing away the trust of ordinary citizens that criminals will be punished and punished properly.

“In the last few weeks we have witnessed a serial failure of Labour to protect the citizen, with murders of innocent people by criminals variously on early release or probation, and now we’re finding that ever more serious crimes are not being brought to court at all.”

Criminologist Dr David Green, of the Civitas think-tank, said: “They appear to have given up making the court system work and doing anything about delays and the deviousness of defence lawyers.

“This is part of the wider problem that the Home Office has an anti-prison bias. But while they regard prison as uncivilised, they don’t seem to care whether the alternatives work or not.”

Of course not! Only intentions matter! Once you’ve built a philosophy, you can’t let anything as banal as reality interfere! I’m not going to reproduce the rest of the article, but isn’t this the mirror-image of NYC’s “broken windows” policy? Well, it would seem that England & Wales will be a petri dish to test that theory in now. Anyone want to bet on which way Britain’s crime rates are going to go? They have made the cop on the beat the judge, but told him, in effect, to not judge.

Here are some of the (as of this writing) 101 comments left in response to this April 3 (not April 1!) story:

If I park in the wrong place or go through a speed camera at five miles per hour more than I should do, then I must pay my dues to society.

Yet, if I go ‘on the rob’ or set fire to the occasional building, I will be let off with a caution. This is madness!

– Jakman, Bognor Regis

—

If the government keep giving guidelines like this to the police forces and burglary and crimes like these are no longer classed as a crime, then the government will soon reach it’s lower target on crime figures and we could soon end up with a crime free country and then we can say that crime is on the decrease, who are we trying to kid.

– Larry, Little Sutton, Ellesmere Port

I think Larry’s on to something here…

How long before there are no such crimes as burglary, arson, vandalism and sex with under age girls? Then the incompetents in government and the Home Office will not need to worry about meeting their own imposed targets!
The anarchy of Blair’s elected dictatorship worsens by the day.

– Brian Tomkinson, Bolton, UK

Seems Brian’s on the same frequency.

Why don’t we just disband the police altogether as they are largely ineffective anyway.
Unless a motorist is involved with the crime of parking without a ticket.

– A.J.Langley, Kent, UK

—

Are the government losing their minds? My friends frail parents aged 80 and 82 were robbed in their home while they watched TV in the lounge. Their bedroom was a total mess and several items were taken including a watch that had belonged to their son who was killed in an accident.

Not content with the pain and suffering they had caused, the burglars phoned them the next day and verbally threatened them.

Give burglars a caution – they should bring back birching!

– Sally, Manchester, UK

—

Having been burgled recently I now come to work in dread of what I may find when I get home. If they do not want to send these scum to jail then they should be taken to the market square and flogged.

– Phil Beardsley, Nottingham, England

—

Typical of this government. Talk about honour among thieves. It won’t be long before it will be the victim who gets locked up for putting temptation in front of weak individuals. It is time they went before we have a revolution in the streets, Paris ain’t that far away!

– Nigel, Somerset

Sorry, Nigel, but as much as it pains me to say it, those of you who still have the balls to revolt are too few and far between, I think.

It really doesn’t matter whether the sentence is a scolding or twenty years imprisonment. Until the police start catching criminals neither ‘punishment’ will act as a deterrent.

– Chris Downing, Rothwell, England

—

Something akin to a licence to kill really – just shows the state of British Justice when it’s more of an offence to drop litter than to burgle someone’s house! No wonder this place has gone to the dogs!

– Ms. Fred Moulson, Desborough

Of course it’s more of an offense to drop litter! You’re a law-abiding citizen who will do as you’re told. If you’re a criminal, they know you won’t show up in court, so what’s the point? But you solid citizens, you’ll take your medicine!

I’m disappointed they are not giving them a safari holiday as well.

– Martyn James Fraser, Liverpool

Don’t give them any ideas, Martyn. They take more than enough of your money in taxes as it is.

We might as well leave our doors and windows open for the burglars to walk in and help themselves.

Far less stressful than getting up in the morning to find that person, or persons unknown, have invaded your privacy whilst you were asleep and caused mayhem.

Of course if I was fined £80 for dropping litter, maybe I could walk into the nearest shop and ask for £80 out of the till to pay it.

The Police wouldn’t do anything. Would they?

– Barbara Brown, Southport, UK

Now that might very well start happening. Except, of course, they won’t be “asking.”

What planet are the police living on at the moment. They’re giving burglars a licence to rob knowing that they are not going to get any punishment. What deterrent is a caution?

Perhaps if they started nipping crime in the bud with big sentences or fines, it might deter people. Everything is in favour of the villain and no rights to the victim.

– Carol Broadhurst, Barnsley, South Yorkshire

What planet are you living on, Carol? The police can only do as they are instructed. It’s not their decision. The “license to rob” comes from the Home Office, not the cops.

But that brings up a good point. It’s time, once again, to replay Sir Robert Peel’s Nine Principles of Modern Policing:

  • The basic mission for which the police exist is to prevent crime and disorder.
  • The ability of the police to perform their duties is dependent upon public approval of police actions.
  • Police must secure the willing co-operation of the public in voluntary observance of the law to be able to secure and maintain the respect of the public.
  • The degree of co-operation of the public that can be secured diminishes proportionately to the necessity of the use of physical force.
  • Police seek and preserve public favour not by catering to public opinion but by constantly demonstrating absolute impartial service to the law.
  • Police use physical force to the extent necessary to secure observance of the law or to restore order only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient.
  • Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
  • Police should always direct their action strictly towards their functions and never appear to usurp the powers of the judiciary.
  • The test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with it.

Here’s a quiz: How many of Sir Robert’s principles have been violated so far?

Well, Since the Crackdown on GUNS Has Failed…

KevinLeave a comment

…it seems only logical, I suppose. Mr. Free Market emailed me a link to the BBC:

Call for crackdown on gun crime

A campaign is being launched aimed at reducing gun crime in Wales.

The number of firearm offences in north Wales was almost six times higher in 2004-2005 than the previous year, according to Home Office figures.

How high was it in 1996, right before the “ban?”

In south Wales, gun offences have more than doubled. There were smaller rises in Gwent and Dyfed-Powys force areas.

Crimestoppers Wales is asking anyone with information on people who own guns or imitation guns being used in crime, to let them know anonymously.

Yes, you too can be an agent of Big Brother, spy and narc on your neighbors. The ones who are otherwise good guys will get arrested and go to jail. The really bad actors will find out who turned them in and torch their houses, or throw hand-grenades through their windows.

The total number of firearm offences in Wales – excluding those involving air weapons – rose from 169 in 2003-2004 to 288 in 2004-2005, according to the Home Office.

Neale Evans, chairman of the independent charity Crimestoppers Wales, said: “We are focusing on people who are on the fringes of gun crime – relatives, friends of people who are being pressurised to get involved in crime and use a gun, or an imitation gun.”

As part of the anti-gun campaign, the charity will be distributing posters and leaflets across Wales.

Note, they haven’t learned yet. “Anti-gun campaign,” not “anti-criminal campaign.” As long as they keep focusing on the wrong target, things will continue to get worse. So, in short, the title to the piece is wrong – it’s not a crackdown on gun crime, it’s another crackdown on guns, which means they haven’t learned a damned thing in the last ten years.

Mr Evans said anyone who may have information about people who may have guns that are being used in criminal activity should call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111. The information will then be passed on to the police.

‘Innocent bystanders’

He added: “By doing this your anonymity will be preserved and you will be playing your part in protecting the community in which you live.

“Crimestoppers does not trace or record any information about any caller and you will not have to give evidence in court.”

The charity said it was not just the criminals who were affected, but “innocent bystanders who can be caught up in this ruthless violence perpetuated by criminals who do not care who gets in the way”.

Criminals, for the most part, that the police are already aware of and are unable to get the Crown Prosecution Service to lock up. Go read The Policeman’s Blog for an hour or two.

It said the growth of imitation firearms over “real firearms” is no less worrying, as criminals use them as blunt instruments or to intimidate and threaten people.

However, the publicity Crimestoppers has generated about imitation firearms has not found favour with everyone.

Tim Wyborn, spokesman for a pressure group linked to a simulation game called Airsoft which uses imitation guns, said the publicity presented replica firearms in a poor light.

Welcome. You’re the next victim of firearm phobia, of a culture that does not recognize the difference between “violent and predatory,” and “violent but protective.” It sees only “violent,” and violence is bad.

But he stressed their games players were against any sort of gun crime.

“Owning an imitation firearm is perfectly legal and there are many legitimate uses of imitation firearms in the UK,” he said.

It’s legal now, until the Nanny-state concludes that letting adults play with toy guns is psychologically harmful and it takes those away, too.

The games players fear they will be adversely affected by impending legislation to ban the sale of replica guns.

And you are right to fear that.

“As the bulk of crime with replicas is by 13 year old children with cheap replica BB guns, a better way of tackling the problem (of those crimes) would be education,” Mr Wyborn added.

Now, I’ve got a question: Is that true? That the bulk of crime with replicas is by children with BB guns? Is the majority of those 288 firearms crimes recorded in Wales kids shooting out windows with BB guns, or is it kids mugging people with BB guns? I’d really like to know. But either way, it’s obvious that “gun control” has been a dismal failure.

So of course the reaction is to “turn up the power” and escalate the failure. After all, the philosophy cannot be wrong!

KevinLeave a comment

Boy, It’s a Good Thing England Banned Handguns!.

Bank of England: Armed Gang Makes Haul

LONDON – A gang of armed robbers tied up 15 employees at a southern England security company and stole the equivalent of $43.5 million, the Bank of England said Wednesday.

The money, about 25 million pounds in bank notes, was stolen overnight from a cash center at Tonbridge in Kent county, a bank spokesman said. No one was injured in the robbery.

At least six men participated in the robbery, Kent police said, and 15 staff members on duty at the security company were tied up during the heist. The thieves, who wore balaclavas and carried handguns, were in the security company building for more than an hour, police said.

Detective Superintendent Paul Gladstone said the robbery was clearly planned in detail over time.

Perhaps next England should ban balaclavas. Or maybe thieves.

“Clearly planned in detail over time.” Good to know that their sharpest detective is all over this one.

(Hat tip to reader Lee P. for the link.)

I’m on “Vacation”

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Which means that for the next couple of weeks I’ll be ripping out my kitchen and painting the inside of my entire house.

Oh. Joy.

There is good news out there, though. He-who-shall-not-be-named reports that Brit Nicky Samengo-Turner, who was arrested on after a random stop-and-search for having a Swiss-army knife and a collapsable baton locked in his briefcase in his car, has been acquitted on the charges of carrying A) a lockback knife and B) an “offensive weapon” in public. He was arrested on Nov. 3 of last year, and it caused some stir in the blogosphere at the time, though I don’t think I wrote about it here. I’m still looking (in vain) for a news piece on the story (somehow I doubt the medja in Old Blighty will find that story particularly compelling), but I’m glad to know that Mr. Samengo-Turner won’t be serving any time for his “offence.” Just paying through the nose for legal fees. All I’ve found is this little blurb in the Telegraph‘s “Business Diary”:

Guilty of not paying attention to handbags

Common sense has prevailed after former banker Nicky Samengo-Turner was cleared of wrong-doing by a jury yesterday. He had been arrested last November under anti-terror legislation for having a pen-knife in his car. During a break from the procedings, his wife’s handbag was snatched in a coffee shop 100 yards from the court. He claims the police have yet to take “much of an interest” in the incident.

Here in Tucson I carry a wickedly sharp Spyderco lockback knife in my pocket, a Leatherman Wave multi-tool on my belt (which has two locking blades, each over 3″ long), and a 9mm Makarov in the glovebox of my truck. None of these are “offensive” weapons. But in England they’d each get me thrown in the slammer.

Remember: “Violent and predatory” vs. “Violent but protective.”

In England, all they see is “violent.”

Except, perhaps, for Mr. Samengo-Turner’s jury. Good on ‘ya, mates.