Thursday 17 July 2008

Crime Falls......Again

Sometimes you have to wonder at the sheer hypocriticalness of some in society, when crime figures fall they are reported to rise when crime figures rise they are reported to be out of control.
Figures reported today show almost all crime offences have fallen by over 7% and yet we are awash with "crime Britain", highlighted most recently by knife crime.

"Who To Blame"
I think the media sensationalising is a massive problem in a democracy such as Britain, you can't have Britain dictated to by hyperbole. Ok i agree there does seem to be a problem with knife crime, but the problem has been going in this country since the war.
The reason it seems that knife crime finally took precedent was due to the murder of a boy who was linked to a celebrity, the papers who had remained on the back burner over a number of poor kids suddenly jumped on Ben Kinsella's death.
And yet crime falls, violent crime has fallen by 12% and the most serious by 8%, i have rarely been a victim of crime.

"Celebrity Death"
So do deaths of a celebrity or a celebrity link prove more important than your average Joe, i would hazard a guess and say yes. For a paper like the Sun to preach against violence when they employ a couple of reporters who have been arrested and convicted of violent crimes and an editor who beat several shades of blue out of her husband (or ex not sure what the case is at the moment) i think it shows high hypocrisy, they've encouraged tighter laws on paedophilia, whilst at the same time they show young 17 year old girls in partial nudity for the pleasure of their dwindling readership, I'm glad to have such a bastion of truth on our newsstands every day.

"Tackling Crime"
So what's the best way in tackling crime, one of the figures shown were crime rose was drug offences, i have serious misgivings about sending people who take drugs to prison. I believe it's the last place any right thinking society should send anyone on drugs. However the alternatives are few and this is a direct indictment of this country's attitude towards deviance since Victorian times.
And a direct culprit of crime is poverty, poverty is the biggest issue this world faces going into the 21st century and yet it was the same entering the the 20th and 19th centuries and as far back as you want to go.
So what should Government do?
Well the increase in poverty is a failure of Labour, and it's the one issue that the main opposition tend to avoid. To them the Poor can help themselves and this has been stable Tory policy for years. Labour should of made this their main priority or otherwise Labour means nothing.
Someone asked me what good was a Labour party in a country that classes themselves mostly middle class, and i said it's to fight poverty as many may kid themselves out of the poorer end of society but they are still working for a wage that will not move them on and they therefore are very working class but not at all proud of it.
Labour have failed on this, hopefully they still have fight enough to battle on after election defeat, this country needs a re-shaped modern Labour party, not new and not old just one that fights on the key principles on which it was built which one was to help the poor.
As for crime....well it's getting better ALL the time.