Police

Ollie Brock (London, Voices from the Crowd): Walking over London Bridge at 11 a.m. yesterday, you could have been forgiven for thinking the hype around the G20 protests had been excessive: it was one part protesters, one part police and two parts media. All groups were represented: anti-capitalists, environmental campaigners, the odd laid-off banker. And they all needed time to co-ordinate. One word to sum up the feeling so far? "Confusion..." said one protester.

Sure enough though, turning onto King William Street heading towards Bank produced the expected crowd, as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse assembled outside the Bank of England. Faced with the choice of being trapped in a police ‘kettle' and wandering free, Voices from the Crowd chose the latter and went in search of some of the more creative statements on show.

The European Clown Bank held firm their corner on Threadneedle Street. Managers of ‘hedgehog funds', they offer wooden batons in an honest ‘stick exchange', and money made of lycra - "it can be stretched out to the end of the month." Clown banker Johann explained the true meaning of E = MC2: Money times Clowns in the Square mile leads to an Emergency...

On the other side of the cordon, police exchanged their bobby hats for riot gear, and VFTC turned a corner. Cordite smoke gave way to smells of cannabis and patchouli: the Climate Camp's occupation of Bishopsgate was in full swing. In stead of riot shields it was flapjacks, brownies, and peaceful if nebulous ideas. Here the riot police van was surrounded not by angry protesters taunting the officers, but a few teenagers using a tent pole to try and free their stranded beach ball from the van's protective grille.

The most active pocket here was the Golden Block: a spontaneous dance group clad in all shades of yellow. Having planned to join one of the marches, the Block decided in the end that they were enjoying themselves where they were, and stayed in one spot, swinging the day away. Dancer Emanuel explained the ethos: "Before making changes you have to find peace in yourself. Once you have found your own happiness, you can start to spread it to others."

Blood on the shoulders of police jackets and surging throngs outside the Bank of England told another story - but outside the noisy nuclei of the protests, positive feelings reigned. A single word to sum up the protesters' feelings was still a lot to ask, but one green campaigner nearly managed it: "Optimistic... weirdly." Not the Financial Times, a satirical newspaper born this week, provided much of the April Fools fun. A privately funded publication that hit a circulation of 25,000 today, it welcomes any contributions: http://ft2020.com.

So what face did the protesters give to Britain for its worldwide performance? Reports today of a death at the protests will certainly do it no good, though reading on one sees that the death has been declared as being of natural causes. As for the solitary window break at the RBS building, this is a small focal point for a media that was as ready for a punch-up as the Met. It seems matters as broad as those discussed in the G20 talks will bring out the full spectrum of protesters and protesting styles, from the anarchist Black Block to abundant free cake. We can only hope that, amid the myriad images of truncheons and the odd bleeding head, the world saw some of the clowns too.

Tom Griffin (London, OK): Politics.co.uk asked last week whether Britain is a police state. Editor Ian Dunt's thoughtful analysis concludes that we are not there yet, but many of the site's readers apparently disagree.

At least we are not alone in Europe. One correspondent of Newropeans magazine is asking the same question about France after this experience:

I’m teaching a lesson when all of a sudden, without warning, four determined policemen irrupt in my classroom, accompanied by a sniffer dog-handler and his animal. No one says hello, no one introduces himself. With no further preamble, the dog is sent throughout the classroom. The pupils are utterly startled. I question the intruders, asking how such a procedure is possible in this place, no one replies. As I insist, I’m being told that I’d rather shut up.

Stuart Weir (Cambridge, Democratic Audit): We are a moderate lot.  We believe in the rule of law and believe uncertainly that no-one is above the law in this country. Since the 1980s at least, we have become fearful of the powers that governments shower on the police and alarmed often by their conduct. But we have shrunk from arguing that we live in a ‘police state’ – we don’t want to exaggerate.

But at the effective end of a long and tortuous legal process, an inquest jury has been denied the right to pass a verdict of ‘unlawful killing’ on the ruthless shooting dead by police marksmen of an innocent man on his way to work. With curious blindness, this extra-judicial killing has been treated as a one-off, with plenty of coverage of the issues that have arisen directly, but little or no analysis of the longer-term context. The Sunday broadsheets were almost entirely silent.

Tom Griffin (London, OK): The jury at the inquest into the death of Jean Charles De Menezes has this afternoon delivered an open verdict. This was their only option other than lawful killing, after the coroner ruled out a verdict of unlawful killing at the end of the hearing last week. This led to protests from the family, of which some previously unreported details are now coming out.

The Justice4Jean campaign are reporting via their twitter feed that the jury ruled police did not shout a warning before shooting De Menezes.

Rick Muir (London, IPPR): A lot of contradictory claims have been made in recent weeks about ‘police independence’. The Home Secretary says that she could not have intervened in the police investigation into Home Office leaks because it is for the police, not politicians, to initiate criminal investigations. Jackie Ashley argues simultaneously that Jacqui Smith should have intervened, but that it is dangerous for elected politicians to get too involved in policing. Sir Ian Blair says that the elected Mayor of London should not have the power to sack him but concedes at the same time the police should be accountable to the public.  So, what is going on here?  

The problem is that none of the participants in this debate share an understanding of what is meant by police independence.  No one wants to ‘politicise’ policing, with police officers taking their operational instructions from ministers or US-style elected sheriffs. We do not want to go back to the days of the Sidney Street Siege, at which the then Home Secretary Winston Churchill took personal command of a police raid in the East End, standing in the street issuing instructions dressed in a top hat and fur coat. Everyone agrees that the police should impartially apply the laws of the land, rather than serve the executive branch.  At the same time everyone agrees that police officers should be accountable to someone, and in a democracy, that someone has to be elected. 

Tom Griffin (London, OK): I spoke to a civil servant yesterday who was very bullish in support of the police's decision to arrest Damian Green.  According to their version of events, documents were being leaked systematically by a woman with links to the Conservative Party who was employed as cover for another member of staff. It looks as if Mick Fealty has heard a similar account.

If, for instance, Mr Green had someone in the Home Office who seemed to be less motivated by a desire to expose corruption, and more by a determination to run an anti-government campaign from within a government department, it would be a different matter - particularly if Mr Green knew this to be the case.

If, for instance, this person was leaking other material to other senior Conservative spokesmen, for example - or worse still, if this person had some sort of record of Conservative activism - then it really would be a problem.

Tom Griffin (London, OK): The arrest of Conservative immigration spokesman Damian Green has provoked a huge amount of comment  since the first hints started emerging on the blogosphere last night.

ConservativeHome's Tim Montgomerie is incensed...

Given that Boris Johnson and others received prior warnings - but were unable to act - it seems very unlikely that a Home Office Minister (who did have the power to stop the police and may have even had to sanction what happened) did not have prior knowledge.  Such is the reputation of this Government, few are likely to believe ministers' denials anyway.  If Jacqui Smith did know she should resign.

...but so to is Lib Dem Shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne...

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): The arrest of Damien Green, early blogged by Tom (below), included a police search of his office in the House of Commons. Let's assume that there was no political direction or permission, even of an informal kind. This makes it an even more dangerous attack on democracy given that his crime was to expose wrongdoings - as he should. What do the police think they are up to? If the answer is 'just doing their job' it means they have lost any belief in parliamentary democracy. Before we get coldly outraged by this - as we will - we have to ask: is there any basis in the experience of the police for ceasing to believe in parliamentary democracy?

I think there is. The police spent many months and a huge amount of money investigating the cash for peerages scandal. They interviewed the Prime Minister twice, something that had never happened before to a serving premier. The reason is obvious to everyone. Parliament and Downing Street was a crime scene. Peerages were indeed being sold for cash. I recall watching Blair saying (but I can't find the link or the transcript) in a press conference that of course individuals who assisted political parties with large sums might be ennobled and there was nothing wrong with this - provided it didn't take place in the same transaction. The cynicism was transparent.

So there is a very strong and recent experience in the upper levels of the police that politicians get away with breaking the law. Even more annoying, when the police fail to make a case against them stand up strongly enough for a court of law, they are then attacked by the same politicians for wasting public money.

Thus the arbitrary, corrupt and despotic behaviour of New Labour under Blair has now bred an arbitrary and despotic police command. We are reaping Blair's failure to believe in democracy. 

Which makes the widening of the intrusive extension of state powers that we are now witnessing all the more a matter for profound concern. Lacking a deep belief in public values and democratic accountability, as they evidently do, those who use these powers will desire to expand them - if only in order to protect themselves from the inevitable abuses generated by their own all too human incompetance. 

This adds a new urgency to the fight for a principled modern liberty that is exercised by us as free citizens governing our own democracy. We can't just look to 'parliament' to do this.

I am working with Henry Porter (see his blog in Comment Is Free) and others on a Convention on Modern Liberty that will call on all those concerned to debate the issues and what to do next. The event and associated meetings around the country is still under construction. A combined effort is going to be needed.

Damian O'Loan (Paris): It is not only in the UK that the introduction of Taser electronic pistols has ignited controversy.  As Amnesty’s Patrick Corrigan has highlighted here, the weapons’ implications for the Right to Life have been called into question by a judicial review to be decided in Belfast in January.  Directly comparable issues are also coming before the courts in France.

Over here, however, it is the distributors of the weapons, SMP technologies, who have been initiating the actions.  The French company has launched defamation and slander lawsuits following citations of Amnesty International figures citing up to 290 fatalities following exposure to the weapons’ 50,000-volt force.

Peter Facey (London, Unlock Democracy): Following the resignation (or was it sacking?) of the Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair after Boris Johnson said he did not have confidence in him, there has been a lot of talk about political control of policing.

Boris has been criticised for overstepping his authority and the Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has made it clear that she will ultimately decide who is the next Commissioner and not Boris. Just to complicate matters even further, Ken Livingstone has now come out in support of Johnson, after a fashion.

What this does is make it clear that we actually have political control of policing, it's just central control. So the question really is who should the head of London’s police force be accountable to, the Home Secretary or the Mayor and Assembly?

At the moment the present system is a mess. The Met is London’s police force but also has national responsibilities. Ultimately these need to be split with the creation of national police unit responsible to the Home Secretary and Parliament and a London force accountable to the Mayor and Assembly and ultimately Londoners. But in the meantime, why not make confirmation of the Home Secretary's nominee for the new Metropolitan Police Commissioner subject to a public confirmation hearing by Metropolitan Police Authority?

Unlock Democracy ran a series of articles about policing and democracy in their latest issue of Citizen, which can be found here (http://www.unlockdemocracy.org.uk/?p=1406).

Tom Griffin (London, OK):Henry Porter added a significant item to the charge sheet against Sir Ian Blair's stewardship of the Metropolitan Police in his Observer column at the weekend:

the conduct of the police during protests against President Bush's visit in June when it was alleged that unreasonable violence was used against the marchers. The surveillance and pursuit of legitimate demonstrators three months afterwards is to say the least very worrying. It smacks of a police state. 

As the Daily Mail and the Guardian reported at the time, 25 people were arrested at the demonstration on 15 June following clashes that erupted after the police sealed off part of Whitehall, and prevented the marchers from handing in a letter to Downing Street.

Reports of further arrests have since surfaced on Indymedia. The Metropolitan Police have confirmed that 3 people were arrested in connection with the demonstration on 1 August, while a fourth person arrested on 20 August has since been charged with theft of a police baton and two counts of assaulting a police officer.

Last month, the Met's Deputy Assistant Commissioner Chris Allison appealed to the public for the identities of another four marchers:

"In a climate where London is at a severe level of threat from global terrorism any attempt to breach security measures designed to protect the President had to be defended by our officers.  

"What our officers did not deserve was to be the subject of such violence, being pelted with bottles and struck with metal barriers. 

"A number of officers even had sharpened sticks poked into their eyes and faces.  The acts of violence we witnessed that day were deplorable and no one could claim they were in any way a lawful demonstration.

"This post event investigation aims to identify and arrest the worst offenders to make them answer for their actions that day."

The Met's allegations are disputed by the Stop the War Coalition, which is asking anyone contacted by the police to get in touch with its defence campaign on 020 7278 6694 or by email at office@stopwar.org.uk:

The Stop the War Coalition has held more than twenty national demonstrations, everyone of which has been peaceful, everyone of which has been stewarded by members of the Stop the War coalition. This one was a particularly well-organised demonstration, one that we had negotiated with the police beforehand, although we hadn't negotiated a march route.

Spokesman Stewart Halforty admitted that some placard sticks may have been thrown over police lines, but said that did not justify the response that followed.

My experience of it was that in a very co-ordinated way, the police drew their batons and that suggests that they were prepared for this. They also had 1,200 police on the day and we think there may even have been more.

For the first time ever they estimated our numbers at the same figure that we estimated them at, 2,500. In fact they seemed to think there were 3,000 there.

Stop the War also points to an account of the demonstration that appeared in the Mail shortly afterwards, which raises some intriguing questions about police tactics:

The man in the T-shirt was tall, well-built and handsome, smiling but with a hint of menace. He pushed aside children and elderly people.

He continued to shout slogans such as: 'Pigs Out.'

On his back was a black rucksack and he carried a professional-looking camera with a large telephoto lens. Hardly the sort of kit for a few snaps of his day out.

My friends and I, standing a few rows back, asked him a couple of times to calm down, but he ignored us.

I wondered why I was drawn to him. Was it his dark good looks or was I worried for the safety of my 70-year-old friend and children nearby?

Then it dawned on me. I had met this man at a party. I tapped him gently on the shoulder and said: 'Have we met before?'

Instantly he recognised me. 'Hi, how are you? It's really nice to see you here.'

My puzzlement grew. This chap wasn't really the sort you'd expect to see shouting abuse at police officers at an anti-war demo. He was, after all, a policeman himself - and a high-ranking one at that.

Charlie Pottins (London, Justice4jean): A killing like that of Jean Charles de Menezes, shot in the head by police on a London Underground train, could happen again, a senior police officer involved in leading the operation has told the inquest into Jean Charles' death.

So far the jury has been given a crash course on police procedures, learning about "Gold" and "Silver" levels of command, designated senior officers(DSO), and the respective roles of SO12(Special Branch), SO13 (Anti-Terrorist branch) and CO19/SO 19 (Firearms) officers.

Tom Griffin (London, OK): The Guardian's profile suggests Sir Ian Blair was a tragic figure, a reformist laid low by his own flaws. He certainly wasn't short of problems, not least the inquest into the death of Jean Charles De Menezes currently underway at the Oval.

In the end, however, it was the determined opposition of London Mayor Boris Johnson which paved the way for the Metropolitan Police Commissioner's resignation this afternoon.

It will be interesting to see how much influence Johnson enjoys over the selection of Blair's successor, especially given the potential for controversy among some of the contenders cited by the BBC.

Patrick Corrigan, (Amnesty Blogs: Belfast and Beyond): As previewed on Belfast and Beyond (Tasers: shocks and secrets) some weeks ago, a Belfast child has applied for and yesterday won the right to challenge the PSNI's decision to start using Tasers.

If successful, the child's court challenge could have UK-wide implications for police use of the 50,000-volt device.

 Damian O'Loan (Paris): The situation in Stormont may now merit the term crisis. A prominent Sinn Fein representative in the South of Ireland, Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin TD, has threatened collapse of the Assembly if policing and justice are not devolved: “we will have no option but to pull out our ministers.” Jeffrey Donaldson MP, MLA, Privy Council member and possible Justice Minister, has called for clarification of the threat: “Do they want to stay in the executive? If they do, let's meet and address these issues."

Both sides claim the other refuses to talk; it is widely held that Sinn Fein are blocking the passage of other Ministerial business until their key electoral promises have been resolved – or as Peter Robinson has it: “Adams seems to think that it is the role of everyone to move to his position.” The other parties are unforgiving, nationalist SDLP leader Mark Durkan saying “The soundings coming from Sinn Féin at the minute are more ludicrous than ominous.” Moderate unionism's leader Sir Reg Empey warned “This sort of behaviour cannot continue for much longer.”

Tom Griffin (London, OK): It's an interesting reflection on the rise of the database state that some of the best reporting on UK civil liberties these days can be found in the pages of online I.T. magazine The Register.

In the latest example, writer John Ozimek follows up the case of former head teacher John Pinnington, which he argues "takes the UK one step closer to becoming an 'informant society' along the lines of the former East Germany or Soviet Union.

 Damian O'Loan (Paris): After months of deadlock, it looks as if there is finally movement on the transfer of policing and justice powers to the Stormont Assembly. Sinn Féin had falsely claimed that a May 'O8 deadline for the transfer was secured in the St Andrews Agreement. The DUP opposed any deadline, which was was fundamental to Sinn Féin's vote to support the police. That support in turn was crucial for the creation of the current Stormont executive – hence the present crisis.

Now the two main parties have decided there will be a single Policing and Justice Department and Minister, and that they will not field candidates.

Stuart Weir (Cambridge, Democratic Audit): Just imagine being ready to drive off to work when an unmarked white van pulls up, armed police pour out and while one policeman smashes a side window of your car, the others drag you and push you to the ground a hand-gun pressed against the back of your head - five days after armed police have shot dead the innocent Jean Charles de Menezes! (The Guardian has CCTV footage of the arrest here)

This was the terrifying ordeal that the entirely innocent Omar Ahmet had to go through having been identified as a possible terrorist suspect by a worker at the hotel where he had stayed the night. The worker had telephoned the Merseyside police after seeing a photo of the suspect in a newspaper and told them that he was "85 per cent" certain that Ahmet was the man. Ahmet is a fair-skinned man of Cypriot heritage; the wanted terrorist was a black Eritrean. He had lodged car rental documents and his credit card with his home address in Maidenhead with the hotel.

Rick Muir (London, IPPR): Police accountability is back on the political agenda. In its draft Queen’s Speech the Government announced that it would allow ‘directly elected representatives’ to oversee local police forces. The Tories too are in favour of greater accountability, promising to abolish police authorities and replace them with a directly elected commissioner for each force.

The case for greater local accountability is strong: despite unprecedented increases in police funding public satisfaction with the police has fallen. Whereas in 1996 64 per cent of people felt that the police did a good or excellent job, this had fallen to just 48 per cent by 2005. Those members of the public who have direct contact with the police as victims of crime tend to rate police performance poorer than members of the public who have not had direct contact with them (the opposite is the case with schools and hospitals).

There are a number of factors behind declining levels of satisfaction with the police service, but by far the most important is the fact that people believe the police have become less responsive to local concerns. Part of this is due to the decline in the number of officers out on the beat - something which the Government is now addressing through its neighbourhood policing programme.

Anthony Barnett (London, OK): This is a very disturbing post by Claire Provost in the New Statesman. If ever there are ever wide scale demonstrations against the authoritarian powers new Labour is granting itself, from ID cards to 42 days to the next war, we can expect FIT to know  our every move. They have powers to monitor all email – mine and yours. You don't know what FIT is? I suggest you read the post and... prepare to protest. Has Boris said anything about it?