Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Josquius]

Not to say the met police stuff isn't bad and all. But that it dominates the news so much really does highlight how London centric our media is. I can't imagine there being half as much fuss if it was another police force facing such scandal.
Then again even having any police would be a positive these days.

[Tamas]

I think what is going to make real reform hard is the simple fact that being a police officer must be a profoundly shitty job. The only perk is the power trips you can have at the expense of otber people so until that changes its going to be attracting a lot of scumbags, I am sure.

[Sheilbh]

Not to say the met police stuff isn't bad and all. But that it dominates the news so much really does highlight how London centric our media is. I can't imagine there being half as much fuss if it was another police force facing such scandal.
Then again even having any police would be a positive these days.

There is definitely something to this though the Met also has national policing responsibilities and she's found that some of the worst issues are in the "elite" areas often performing national duties like close personal protection - which are also the best resourced while the actual local policing is under-resourced. The example she gave of the firearms units basically spending money on whatever they want while rape kits aren't being stored properly or processed, for example. Similarly the Met is answerable to two people the Home Secretary and Mayor which I don't think is helpful - so I think part of the story is national and I think that in itself is part of the problem.

But you're right and there are wider issues. I've mentioned it before but Cleveland Police have been in special measures for four years and particularly found to be failing to "prevent crime, protect the public, apprehend criminals or deal with internal corruption" which sounds to me like the basic job description/expectation of a police force. If it was in or closer to London, I think it would've been a bigger story.

There's similar controversies with Police Scotland - four times the number of deaths in police custody than the rest of the UK. Huge institutional failures resulting from the merger meaning 999 and otther reports from the public weren't actually being processed properly, so the police weren't responding etc. Basically the system connecting the people who take the calls and the frontline police broke down.

Edit: One sentence summary from Stephen Bush: " The Metropolitan Police: an organisation where all that changes is the precipitating murder for the next damning report."

[The Larch]

There is definitely something to this though the Met also has national policing responsibilities and she's found that some of the worst issues are in the "elite" areas often performing national duties like close personal protection - which are also the best resourced while the actual local policing is under-resourced. The example she gave of the firearms units basically spending money on whatever they want while rape kits aren't being stored properly or processed, for example. Similarly the Met is answerable to two people the Home Secretary and Mayor which I don't think is helpful - so I think part of the story is national and I think that in itself is part of the problem.

How the Met police is responsible for national level stuff is flabbergasting to me.

[Grey Fox]

There is definitely something to this though the Met also has national policing responsibilities and she's found that some of the worst issues are in the "elite" areas often performing national duties like close personal protection - which are also the best resourced while the actual local policing is under-resourced. The example she gave of the firearms units basically spending money on whatever they want while rape kits aren't being stored properly or processed, for example. Similarly the Met is answerable to two people the Home Secretary and Mayor which I don't think is helpful - so I think part of the story is national and I think that in itself is part of the problem.

How the Met police is responsible for national level stuff is flabbergasting to me.

Really? It fits with everything else with how insane that country is run. I'm starting to understand's Jos hate for everything London related.

[Tamas]

[The Larch]

There is definitely something to this though the Met also has national policing responsibilities and she's found that some of the worst issues are in the "elite" areas often performing national duties like close personal protection - which are also the best resourced while the actual local policing is under-resourced. The example she gave of the firearms units basically spending money on whatever they want while rape kits aren't being stored properly or processed, for example. Similarly the Met is answerable to two people the Home Secretary and Mayor which I don't think is helpful - so I think part of the story is national and I think that in itself is part of the problem.

How the Met police is responsible for national level stuff is flabbergasting to me.

Really? It fits with everything else with how insane that country is run. I'm starting to understand's Jos hate for everything London related.

It does fit, but it doesn't make it any less head scratching.

[Sheilbh]

Really? It fits with everything else with how insane that country is run. I'm starting to understand's Jos hate for everything London related.

Fair.

It is a very classic story of power in Britain. The "police" were never set up or organised on a general or principled level. Police forces were set up some, like the Met (first in England) by parliament, and others (like Glasgow, first in Scotland) by local government. Over time the Met accrued power and expertise doing stuff that was national like counter-terrorism (from way back in the days of the Fenians) to serious investigations in particularly difficult cases (the man from Scotland Yard).

But there's since never been a year zero moment of things getting entirely re-founded or rationally re-organised - and it's something anyone working in a large organisation has experienced, if someone's doing a job already it's more difficult to set up a new function for that (especially as none of these scandals have really been about the Met's performance in those national areas) and similarly once someone has a power/authority they tend to guard it pretty fiercely. Reform as it's happened has been incremental - and the national bit works.

Even this report is sort of an example of that - the problem isn't really in the Met's national functions, but in its failures as a local police force for London. The bit that isn't broken isn't going to get reformed. But I think it does lead to messed up accountability and I think an organisation that will give resources to the more "elite" national stuff than the local day-to-day policing.

There's also a standard see-saw of Home Secretaries announcing national forces as a "British FBI" followed by panics about an overbearing national police force like a "British FBI" The reality is none of those national forces so far have really been able to establish themselves institutionally - and they have fucked up in their duties (often, maybe, because they're starting from zero). For example the Serious Fraud Office has a really ropey reputation and record. In part because of that they get reformed quite regularly. So New Labour established the National Crime Squad, this got disbanded and reformed into the Serious and Organisation Crime Agency by Labour five years later and then reformed into the National Crime Agency by Theresa May in 2013 (which is still around and may get some of the Met's functions). That fairly regular organisational churn might help explain why they've struggled.

[The Larch]

But there's since never been a year zero moment of things getting entirely re-founded or rationally re-organised

The lack of a proper, burn it to the ground, revolution/civil war/regime change, you mean? 

[Sheilbh]

But there's since never been a year zero moment of things getting entirely re-founded or rationally re-organised

The lack of a proper, burn it to the ground, revolution/civil war/regime change, you mean? 

Yeah. Same with why we don't have a codified constitution. We had our revolution early and since then the institutions always bend and reform just enough to avoid a repeat.

There's not been a "constitutional moment" when the state is entirely reorganised or constructed on a rational basis like you get after a revolution or after occupation/post-war, or like Eastern Europe a moment of democratisation. Instead institutions might get added, there might be some (occasionally radical) reforms but it's not normally on a systemic, rationalised basis but just powers building up, like sediment, to meet new needs on the lines of existing structures.

[The Larch]

But there's since never been a year zero moment of things getting entirely re-founded or rationally re-organised

The lack of a proper, burn it to the ground, revolution/civil war/regime change, you mean? 

Yeah. Same with why we don't have a codified constitution. We had our revolution early and since then the institutions always bend and reform just enough to avoid a repeat.

There's not been a "constitutional moment" when the state is entirely reorganised or constructed on a rational basis like you get after a revolution or after occupation/post-war, or like Eastern Europe a moment of democratisation. Instead institutions might get added, there might be some (occasionally radical) reforms but it's not normally on a systemic, rationalised basis but just powers building up, like sediment, to meet new needs on the lines of existing structures.

Then we're in agreement, I always thought that the UK badly needed a proper revolution. 

[Sheilbh]

For sure - though like industrialisation it's not that we didn't have one. We were just an early adopter so not able to learn later best practice (the French ).

[Josquius]

Knowing the UK however if we did have a revolution it would be a tory one which makes things even worse.

[Sheilbh]

Knowing the UK however if we did have a revolution it would be a tory one which makes things even worse.

I mean last time, we beheaded a king and had proto-communists proposing common property and government based on Biblical Israel. Maybe not necessarily better but certainly willing to think radically and outside the box

Speaking of which, I suspect re-building party unity is going to be a challenge whoever wins, from political editor of the Herald:

Tom Gordon
@HTScotPol
Senior SNP MP calls Kate Forbes a sex-obsessed religious fundamentalist

Edit: My instinct on reading that was that that senior SNP MP suspects Kate Forbes is going to win.

[HVC]

Sure makes it seem like she'd be fun to date at least