23 February (Part 2) - Crime and Disorder in Bexley
Only
John Watson and I showed up for last Thursday’s Crime and Disorder Overview
and Scrutiny Committee meeting - plus the committee and a guest councillor or two of course.
Chairman councillor Alan Downing saw the silly side of asking us if we were
going to take photos and if we objected to being photographed, not that it
stopped him going through the ritual. I took only one during the meeting.
If there is a highlight to this meeting it is the Borough Commander’s crime
report but I had forgotten something. I’d heard his report at the
Policing Engagement
Group’s meeting three weeks ago. Chief Superintendent Peter Ayling used the
same script, so I heard once again that burglaries were up and it was due to too
many villains being released from prison at the same time, organised gangs of
Romanians and that the higher risk areas were along the A2 corridor which
affords an easy escape route.
The questions and complaints were much the same as from the public on 3rd February. That the
communications system stinks. No one ever responds to questions, no one ever
tells anyone anything. This time it was councillors complaining and giving
examples. C.S. Ayling said the new arrangements did not provide for a dedicated
communications team but he would try to improve matters.
Councillor Philip Read did not have anything good to say about the council’s
crime survey. The numbers participating year on year steadily declines and is
now so low that if the figures were divided into wards they would be
statistically unreliable. The problem is council cuts. Only half an employee
could be spared to organise the survey.
Before all that, Rob Clarke, the Assistant Chief Officer of the London Probation
Service, attempted to describe what was about to happen to the probation
services. At the previous meeting
a lady from the probation service made a right
old mess of trying to tell the committee what was going on, a fact that chairman
Downing referred back to. Rob Clarke did not do an awful lot better. I once had
to give a lecture extolling the virtues of a plan I knew was doomed to failure
and so I sympathised with Rob Clarke, although I think I fell short of saying
neither the staff nor the Parliamentary Select Committee agrees with the plan
which was described as “a very difficult process” and “a very complex process”.
Councillor John Wilkinson said “it seems to be a very vague sort of system”.
Councillor Brenda Langstead feared that allowing a private company
(Serco was mentioned along the way) to take over
probation services would end up with the awful situation which has allowed
care
workers’ conditions of employment to fall below legal requirements.
Councillor Philip Read picked up on the only good sign: that probation services
were to be extended to those who had served fewer than twelve months in prison.
The London Probation Trust will cease to exist on 31st May 2014.
Council officer Diane Kraus (see top right of enlarged photo) spoke about the measures taken in connection with the Scrap Metal Dealers’ Act
2013. Clearly it was not as well drafted as it should have been because the
procedures licensed scrap collectors must adopt can vary depending on whether
scrap is picked up from just inside or outside private property in a way which is
both confusing and impractical. The council was having to take a fairly relaxed
interpretation but the restrictions explain why I have accumulated over several
months a large box of metal taken from old computers, too heavy to lift. In the
old days I could have left it on the drive and it would have disappeared within 24 hours.
Now it will probably go to landfill. But if it helps keep railway signalling cable out of
the hands of Peter Ayling’s Romanians…
Please note; I have a Romanian for a neighbour. You couldn’t meet a nicer bloke.
The pattern detected with the sound system
was maintained at this meeting, it was rubbish again, not helped by councillors Cheryl Bacon, John Wilkinson and
Michael Tarrant not bothering to switch on their microphones. When will someone
remove that ugly white screen which has blighted the chamber all year and reveal the
council’s crest before the place is smashed up in May?