Iain Dale (and other Conservative commentators) are exulting that “the war on the motorist” is to end.  He has been whipped into a state of frothing excitement by the story on the front page of today’s Sunday Times (hidden behind a pay wall, but Iain Dale helpfully reproduces most of the article – so he will presumably be in Rupert Murdoch’s bad books now) that suggests that speed cameras are to be abolished.

40% of the budgets of local road safety partnerships are to be cut and all over the country speed cameras are going to be switched off as a result.

While this is joyful news for the likes of Iain Dale – who has, he admits, nine points on his driving licence for driving too fast (so one more contravention would mean that he would be disqualified from driving) – it must be much less welcome news for the families of the more than 2000 individuals who are killed or seriously injured on the roads each year.

The Coalition Government is, of course, ignoring the evidence that this expenditure saves lives, such as the paper in the British Medical Journal which concluded:

“Existing research consistently shows that speed cameras are an effective intervention in reducing road traffic collisions and related casualties.”

It is also ignoring the local campaigns of its own Ministers, like the ubiquitous Lynne Featherstone MP who is campaigning for a 20mph zone throughout her constituency, who writes in her blog (quite sensibly for once, despite the italics):

“Last year there were six deaths in Haringey – as well as injuries. One little girl, for example, had both legs broken and will never be able to do sport or such like again – in her life.

From evidence elsewhere, 20mph saves lives, reduces seriousness of injuries and cuts pollution. 20mph as a pan borough speed limit has the downside of being a blanket policy – but the big upside of being simple, uniform policy. It’s a common complaint of motorists that rules are too complicated and are enforced wrongly.”

And then she adds:

“There would clearly be a need for enforcement to make sure that there was a penalty to not observing the limit.”

So how might this enforcement be managed efficiently?  Speed cameras, of course.  Which her Government now wants to stop using.

According to a German News Service, a man from the Rhineland has been arrested for spying on more than 150 girls in their bedrooms by hacking into their computers and using their webcams to watch them, provoking warnings that others will be doing the same thing.

Apparently, Thomas Floß from the association of data protection advisors, discovered the case. He often visits schools to talk with children about data protection and sensible behaviour on the internet and gives a presentation including a video showing how children can be spied on via their webcam.

“I want to show how dangerous webcams are,” he said. “I became suspicious when from February, increasing numbers of girls expressed the suspicion this was happening to them.”

According to the report:

“Two girls told him the little lights on their webcams were not going out when they had finished using them. On examining one of the computers Floß discovered a so-called Trojan computer program which was being used to control the equipment, and which had been spread via the chat service ICQ.

The hacker had allegedly broken into the chat service account of one schoolgirl, and used it to choose which others he wanted to spy upon, and send the Trojan to their computers.

He was traced to the Aachen region and arrested – when police officers arrived at his home they found several live feeds to bedroom cameras running on his computer.

Floß said he believed many more people were doing the same thing. “I have visited 50 to 60 schools, and every time at least one schoolgirl tells me they have such a problem [with webcams not switching off],” he said.”

I have already explained that I really don’t mind.

However, just in case you really really want to cast your vote for this blog in the Total Politics annual beauty parade, this is what you have to do:

The rules are:
1. You must vote for your ten favourite blogs and rank them from 1 (your favourite) to 10 (your tenth favourite).
2. Your votes must be ranked from 1 to 10. Any votes which do not have rankings will not be counted.
3. You MUST include at least FIVE blogs in your list, but please list ten if you can. If you include fewer than five, your vote will not count.
4. Email your vote to toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com
5. Only vote once.
6. Only blogs based in the UK, run by UK residents or based on UK politics are eligible. No blog will be excluded from voting.
7. Anonymous votes left in the comments will not count. You must give a name.
8. All votes must be received by midnight on 31 July 2010. Any votes received after that date will not count.

So I’m not asking you to do it, but I really won’t mind if you do……

Steve O’Connell, a Conservative member of the London Assembly and a Croydon Council Cabinet member, has a bee in his bonnet about the cost of policing public demonstrations.  He has raised it at the London Assembly and now today at a meeting of the Metropolitan Police Authority he asked the Commissioner how costs could be reduced.

His thesis is that policing demonstrations costs a lot of money and that for most Londoners there are higher policing priorities.  Both points are true.  However, his conclusion goes rather further.

His proposal is – in essence – that in an era of financial austerity demonstration organisers should be told that their demonstration cannot go ahead if the police cannot afford to police it properly.

So the implication is that in the future demonstrations – particularly if they are likely to be controversial or that the participants are likely to be angry or rowdy (and who is going to judge that?) – are liable to be banned and if they go ahead those participating will be arrested (also not without its policing implications).

Steve O’Connell is a senior member of the Metropolitan Police Authority (he chairs the Finance Committee). He is also a senior member of the Conservative Party in London.

It is no accident that he has raised these points now.

The Coalition Government knows how problematic some of their policies are going to be, particularly as the massive cuts in public services start to take effect.

They also know how convenient it will be if dissent can be suppressed in the name of cost saving.

Steve O’Connell was clearly flying a kite on behalf of the Coalition.  He certainly hasn’t been slapped down by more senior members of his Party.

So what price their alleged commitment to civil liberties?

The Metropolitan Police Authority is in session and and Deputy Mayor Kit Malthouse AM, DCiC* and SDEI**, is NOT in the Chair.  (This was not a deliberate snub to the petitioner but a pre-planned holiday enabling him to devote August to cuttingreviewing the Metropolitan Police budget.)

So it was left to the MPA’s Vice Chair, Reshard Auladin, to welcome former Mayor, Ken Livingstone, into the Chamber at City Hall to present his petition to the Authority.  His petition was an initial shot across the bows of the Mayor’s budget process for the Metropolitan Police (hand on tiller: Kit Malthouse) and said:

‘We call on the Tory led Metropolitan Police Authority and the Tory Mayor Boris Johnson to reverse the decision to cut 455 police officers and guarantee the future of London’s dedicated 630 safer neighbourhood police teams.’

The discussion was predictable, but the body language of Conservative Assembly Members was more interesting.  They displayed all the signs of having been through a trade union negotiating skills course as taught during the 1970s.  This would have educated them in the value of distraction activity while an opponent (ie management) is talking.

In this case, as Ken Livingstone started his presentation (5 minutes as permitted by Standing Orders), Steve O’Connell’s distress at having the former Mayor in the same room became apparent.  He pulled faces, chewed his glasses, tapped his pen frenetically on the desk, leant back in his chair studying the roof of City Hall eight floors above, and finally got up from his seat, so that he could walk to the edge of the Chamber with his back to the former Mayor and gaze at the river and the Tower of London.  Meanwhile, James Cleverly wandered in late, realised with a look of shock that he would be sitting adjacent to Ken Livingstone, and then spent a happy few minutes shuffling his papers without looking to his side.

And what was the substance of the Conservative response?  It seemed to rest on the fact that the police officers being lost from the budget were displaced by a policy decision taken during Ken Livingstone’s Mayoralty.  That decision related to police officers being released from administrative duties and replaced by specialist staff – a more sensible use of resources.  Ken’s point was that he would have reallocated those officers to front-line duties rather than seeing a net drop in police numbers.

This then degenerated into  “We’re all in this together/Mismanagement of the economy by the previous Government” rant from Steve O’Connell – despite the fact that the cut in numbers relates to a Mayoral budget agreed last year in advance of the current financial problems.

And James Cleverly, who had promised in his blog that he would “tear into Livingstone” at the meeting confined himself to suggesting that the Police Authority should stop receiving petitions as they might be used for political purposes (actually, as an old-style Stalinist, I rather agree with that point, but his intervention was hardly the “going for the jugular” moment we had been led to expect).

*DCiC = Dog Catcher in Chief

**SDEI = Shadow Directly Elected Individual

A liitle bird tells me that Sir Paul Stephenson, the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis, is apparently impatient with – if not irritated by – some of the tone of recent meetings of the Metropolitan Police Authority.  He feels that the questions he is asked by some members of the Authority are hardly strategic or are nit-picking in tone and certainly fail to acknowledge the overall good performance of the Met.

I am told he is particularly infuriateddelighted by a number of the questions tabled for tomorrow’s meeting of the Authority.

His particular favourites include:

“Can the Commissioner provide details of the Diversity Training that individual members of the MPS Management Board have received in the past 3 years.” (tabled by Chris Boothman)

And this:

“According to press reports:  ‘Police are to take a more relaxed approach to children cycling on pavements after Boris Johnson secured support from the Met Commissioner.  Sir Paul Stephenson is backing the Mayor’s suggested change.’  Is it true that Sir Paul is backing this move?  If so:  What does Sir Paul feel might be the equality implications of this policy change?  Has an equality impact assessment been done on it?  If so, can we see a copy? If not, will one be done before the policy change comes into effect?” (tabled by Kirsten Hearn)

(It is, of course, true that people cycling on the pavement is hazardous for frail pedestrians or those with disabilities.  Although it is also true that young children would be in danger cycling on busy roads.)

But the question that has provoked the most (so far) private invective is this one relating to Sir Paul’s highly regarded Police Foundation lecture:

“In your speech to the Police Foundation you talked about the devastating impact that organised crime has on the economy, and the problems that you have in tackling this problem. I think it’s regrettable that we need to read about this in the press. Do you not think that this is an important issue which it would have been appropriate to discuss with members of the MPA at the Full Authority?” (tabled by Dee Doocey)

I am sure that, as usual, Sir Paul will behave impeccably at the meeting and that the mask of civility will not slip.  But privately, he will be looking forward to this month’s White Paper that is expected to confirm the coalition Government’s plans to abolish police authorities.

Earlier this evening I heard Sir Paul Stephenson, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, deliver the Police Foundation Annual Lecture (given each year in memory of Lord John Harris – no relation).

Sir Paul’s lecture, entitled “Fighting Organised Crime in an Era of Financial Austerity”, was insightful and thought-provoking.

And the thought it provoked in me was how does tackling serious crime fit into the Coalition Government’s agenda?

The answer, if you listen to Sir Paul (although he was much too polite to say it so explicitly), was that it doesn’t.

The lecture spelt out the impact that serious organised crime has directly and indirectly on communities and its financial and economic cost to the country.  And Sir Paul then pointed out that, despite the significant improvements in recent years:

“The specialist resources devoted by the police service to addressing the threat from organised crime remains uncoordinated.  ….  the  service has no organised crime strategy, no established national tasking process and no meaningful performance measures.”

He didn’t say – although he could have done – that the Coalition’s Programme for Government doesn’t mention serious organised crime in the chapter on “Crime and Policing” and the closest it gets to a mention anywhere in the document is in the chapter on “Immigration” which promises to:

“create a dedicated Border Police Force, as part of a refocused Serious Organised Crime Agency, to enhance national security, improve immigration controls and crack down on the trafficking of people, weapons and drugs. We will work with police forces to strengthen arrangements to deal with serious crime and other cross-boundary policing challenges, and extend collaboration between forces to deliver better value for money.”

Refocussing SOCA on immigration hardly solves the problem Sir Paul was describing.

He did, however, reveal that the Government is now drafting a paper on organised crime – so I suppose that must be progress.  However, before we get our expectations too high, he warns that this:

“must not be a collection of fine words and generic statements.”

…. perhaps he’s seen the draft.

And he concluded with a stark warning:

“I wonder how many Chief Constables across the country are going to be able and willing to balance the very proper desire and requirement for local community policing, with the challenge of maintaining at least existing capability to deal with the high end but often less obvious demands of serious organised crime.  And is the situation about to get even more complex?  Will the new accountability and governance model for police forces, incorporating directly elected local individuals, lead to the unintended consequence of further eroding existing limited organised crime capability?”

And, if the Coalition omits tackling serious organised crime from its programme for crime and policing, what will happen with directly elected police chiefs?

I hope we don’t have to wait for a Sicilian-style breakdown of civic authority before tackling organised crime reappears on the Coalition’s priority list.

I very rarely try to catch TV or radio programmes in which I have been interviewed, but after a couple of people mentioned how good the programme was, I did make an exception and tracked down the broadcast from last Monday afternoon.

So I have only just listened to the Radio 4 feature programme “The Summer That Changed London“.  As an evocation of London and, in particular, the impact of July 2005 (the month of Live8, the declaration of London as the venue for the 2012 Olympics, the 7/7 bombings, the 21/7 failed bombings, and the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes) on London and Londoners, it is brilliant.

But don’t take my word for it, listen – you can disregard the clips from my interview.   But hurry, you only have two days before it comes off the web-site.

There were a series of exchanges this afternoon in House of Lords Question Time on the sequence of events in Northumberland following the release from prison of Raoul Moat on 1st July.

Baroness Patricia Scotland, the Shadow Attorney General, had tabled the follwoing “topical” question:

“To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps were taken by Northumbria Police when the recent warning from HM Prison Durham was received; and whether a multi-agency risk assessment conference was called to assess the risk faced by Samantha Stobbart.”

This elicited the following answer from Baroness Neville-Jones, the Home Office Minister of State:

“My Lords, Northumbria Police received information on Friday 2 July from Durham prison that Mr Moat had threatened to cause Ms Stobbart serious harm. The chief constable referred the handling of the information to the Independent Police Complaints Commission, which will conduct an independent investigation to determine whether Northumbria Police responded adequately. I also understand that Northumbria Police did not conduct a multi-agency risk assessment conference to assess the risk faced by Ms Stobbart.”

Baroness Patricia Scotland tried again (and widened the question into the wider issue of whether the Coalition Government will continue to give the same priority as the previous Labour Government to protecting women at risk of serious domestic violence):

“My Lords, I thank the Minister for that Answer, but can I ask her why they did not? Bearing in mind that these events demonstrate clearly the need for a risk assessment in such circumstances, what steps will be put in place to make sure that multi-agency risk assessments are made? Can she give us an assurance that the Government will maintain the commitment made by the previous Government to hold the 80 remaining multi-agency risk assessment conferences, which are necessary to cover the whole of the country? They are the best way of saving lives and money.”

The Minister responded but was clearly vague on the wider issues:

“My Lords, we certainly agree that the multi-agency risk assessment process is valuable. I have not heard anything from my colleagues that would suggest that we have any intention of doing away with them. There are clearly a number of actions that the police could have taken. One of the reasons why the chief constable referred the actions of her force to the IPCC was to discover what appropriate action could have been taken.”

Former Metropolitan Police Commissioner and former Northumberland Chief Constable reminded the House that there was an active police operation currently under way, which quite properly should not be underminded, and this produced the following exchanges:

“Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington: My Lords, I declare an interest as a former chief constable of Northumbria. Would the Minister not agree that this is a time for supporting Northumbria Police in a most dangerous and difficult situation? This is not a time for apportioning blame in any way, shape or form. Would she also not agree that this will be fully investigated by an independent authority? Let us support the police in their difficult task.

Baroness Neville-Jones: I am sure the whole House, including me, share the sentiments that have just been expressed.

Lord Elystan-Morgan: Was the threat that was made of such a nature that it could have been interpreted as a threat to kill? Does the noble Baroness appreciate that, under the Criminal Law Act 1977, the threat to kill is a very serious offence that is punishable by 10 years’ imprisonment? Was any thought given to arresting this man before he left prison and with a view to prosecution, thus avoiding the possibility of further offences?

Baroness Neville-Jones: My Lords, it is absolutely right to say that such a threat would be very serious. My understanding is that the police force was not informed that there was such a threat to life.”

Labour’s Baroness Liz Symons then reverted to the failure to carry out a risk assessment and again the Minister couldn’t really answer:

“Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, will the Minister address the very specific Question put by my noble and learned friend Lady Scotland—why was a multi-agency risk assessment not held?

Baroness Neville-Jones: Let me give the House the timelines. The prisoner was released on 1 July, the information about this man’s statements was given to the force on 2 July and the chief constable learnt of that information only on 4 July. She referred the matter to the IPCC the following morning; clearly she felt there was a need to do so. I cannot go beyond that at the moment because this matter is under investigation, so I cannot help the House further.”

Lord Brian Mackenzie and I then widened the issues by probing the impact of the Coalition’s policies on opposing police force mergers, on cuts in the policing and prison budgets and on the plans not to proceed with prison sentences of less than six months:

“Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate: My Lords, does the noble Baroness think that there is now a powerful case for looking at the size and number of police forces?

Baroness Neville-Jones: My Lords, the Northumbria Police are receiving mutual aid. My right honourable friend the Home Secretary has been in touch with the force. If it needs any further assistance, it will certainly be given it. As for the noble Lord’s basic question of whether it is a good idea for forces to help each other, we as a party are in favour of forces joining together, or indeed merging if they wish, provided there is local support for such a move.

Lord Harris of Haringey: My Lords, while I am mindful of the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, given that there has been newspaper criticism of the efficiency of the Prison Service in issuing a warning and whatever response there may have been by Northumbria Police, what safety guarantees can the noble Baroness give on behalf of the coalition Government that in a few years’ time, with 25 per cent fewer prison officers and a 25 per cent reduction in police grant, which will no doubt impact disproportionately on specialist resources, this sort of event will not recur, or is the answer that Raoul Moat would not have been in prison at all because his sentence was only 18 weeks and, as far as the coalition is concerned, people like him should roam the country freely?

Baroness Neville-Jones: This individual was in for a short custodial sentence. Under the regime that prevails at the moment, half that sentence was served. As things stand, under legislation that was not passed by this Government, the governor has no discretion to do anything other than release the individual. He performed a duty in warning the police.”

This prompted a Tory backbencher to intervene – clearly unhappy with Coalition policy on not imprisoning people for less than six months:

“Lord Elton: My Lords, does the Minister understand the concern in this House about the release of potentially dangerous prisoners? Will she use this opportunity to revise, review, and preferably improve the method of screening prisoners before they are released in order to protect the public?

Baroness Neville-Jones: My Lords, my noble friend raises a very important issue. I understand that the IPCC will follow the investigation trail, so I think that we will get help in the form of its view about what happened immediately before the release. However, the issue that is raised is important and no doubt we will have to follow it.”

Not really surprising that the Minister looked so relieved that Question Time had finished.

I am not looking for any recognition, as you know these things don’t matter to me at all and I am profoundly disinterested in where this blog comes in the annual Total Politics ranking of political blogs, so I really am not asking for you to vote for me or my blog ……..

but ……..

should you be so inclined (and I repeat I really, really don’t mind one way or the other), this is what you have to do:

The rules are:
1. You must vote for your ten favourite blogs and rank them from 1 (your favourite) to 10 (your tenth favourite).
2. Your votes must be ranked from 1 to 10. Any votes which do not have rankings will not be counted.
3. You MUST include at least FIVE blogs in your list, but please list ten if you can. If you include fewer than five, your vote will not count.
4. Email your vote to toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com
5. Only vote once.
6. Only blogs based in the UK, run by UK residents or based on UK politics are eligible. No blog will be excluded from voting.
7. Anonymous votes left in the comments will not count. You must give a name.
8. All votes must be received by midnight on 31 July 2010. Any votes received after that date will not count.

So I’m not asking you to do it, but I really won’t mind if you do……