WHEN did the police stop policing?
Was it when they were forced to look into a complaint against JK Rowling for suggesting trans women shouldn’t be allowed into female changing rooms?
When they used to drones to criminalise dog walkers during lockdown?
Or, indeed, let off the Tory government’s revellers with £50 penalty charge notices for boozing while the rest of us sat inside obeying orders, like chastised toddlers?
Every year the police are compelled to waste thousands of hours investigating “hate incidents” that are too trivial to be considered crime.
And that’s on us, the general public.
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(In 2018 police were called out after someone alleged racism when a man’s dog barked at them.)
But of course, the rot really set in in the wake of Sarah Everard’s murder.
That one of their own could do something so despicable to a young woman with the rest of her life to lead — then follow it up with appalling, heavy-handled policing at her vigil — left us all despairing of what, exactly, our police are actually for?
Because it certainly isn’t getting the bad guys off the streets.
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Latest stats show not a single car thief was caught in more than 100 neighbourhoods across England and Wales last year.
In a further 558 neighbourhoods where there was one vehicle crime every week, fewer than two per cent were solved with a suspect caught or charged.
Now, in the grand scheme of things, nicking a Ford Mondeo isn’t rape and it isn’t murder.
But it’s bad.
To have your car stolen from outside your home is terrifyingly violating.
Last year my friend had her 4×4 nicked from her leafy West London street.
She called the police.
They seemed largely disinterested.
They said there probably wasn’t “much they could do”.
She ended up tracking the stolen vehicle on an app on her phone and told the cops.
Still they did nothing.
Eventually, she found the abandoned car herself.
Pathetic Twitter hatred
Increasingly people are turning vigilante, doing the leg-work themselves in the face of serial indifference from our Boys in Blue.
And we can be sure that this won’t end well.
In Scotland, a new hate crime law has been rolled out.
On Sunday, the BBC Tweeted a link to an article headlined “Hate crime law could damage trust in police”, prompting a scurry of responses along the lines of: “What trust?”
It’s been described as an Orwellian nightmare.
As one commentator wrote in The Telegraph yesterday: “Imagine living in a world where sitting in your own living room and saying ‘men can’t be women’ could result in the police logging a ‘hate incident’ against your name.”
Not surprisingly, Ms Rowling is not a fan, as it emerged she could be investigated for misgendering trans people.
Obviously we should all be kind.
We should respect all communities and not stir-up pathetic Twitter hatred simply for a few likes.
Which, sadly, some do.
But really, what I’d like to see is police on our streets, in uniform, doing policey things.
Nicking thieves, arresting racist thugs, catching serial killers and rapists.
Not being weighed down by endless red tape, woke do-gooder policies and virtue signalling.
And the police themselves, the vast, vast majority of whom are decent, kind, selfless folk, want this too.
Only then will public faith be restored.
Damian and Liz’s complex relationship
ELIZABETH HURLEY is starring in a raunchy new movie, one which sees her getting it on with another woman.
This, in 2024, is fairly unremarkable (much like her acting, some mean, snipey types might suggest).
Except Strictly Confidential is directed by her 21-year-old SON, Damian.
This is a lad who, for years, has been snapping his mother’s bikini pics, the ones she uses to flog her wares.
Now, each to their own.
But Oedipus would have a field day.
Beeb is one of worst
LAST week, a well-meaning BBC PR delivered something of an own goal.
Flagging footballer-turned-pundit Alex Scott’s recent Instagram story, in which she revealed nearly quitting TV due to rampant sexism and misogyny, the publicist offered-up a supportive quote . . . from the corporation’s Head of Football, a man.
But as our punchy TV Editor Rod McPhee helpfully pointed out: “On Saturday night on BBC One you have Bradley Walsh and Barney Walsh on Gladiators (previously hosted by Ulrika Jonsson) Romesh Ranganathan on The Weakest Link (previously hosted by Anne Robinson), Pointless with Alexander Armstrong and Richard Osman and Michael McIntyre on his Big Show or The Wheel.
“Even during Saturday day the BBC the schedules are male dominated. Surely the greatest misogyny she faces is from the BBC itself?”
Over to you, Aunty.
DJ gag in dad taste
IN his 1985 autobiography, Tony Blackburn claimed to have slept with 250 people.
He’s now admitted he plucked the figure out the air to satisfy (not like that) his ghost writer.
News to my mother, then, who – it pains me to write – was one of the 250.
Yep, one of her favourite Chablis-fuelled boasts back when I was a teenager was to proudly tell me she’d dated the former Radio 1 star back in the day.
Years later, as a cub reporter, I was sent out to interview Tony.
I mentioned my mum: “Jenine Horlock from High Wycombe sends her best.”
“Ah,” he quipped (I hope).
“Are you my long-lost, secret daughter?”
Please God no.
Food for thought
INCREASINGLY, diners are being hit with a ridiculous “carbon footprint charge” on restaurant bills.
The scheme to tackle global warming sees a £1.23 levy per cover.
No one asked for this.
Except, perhaps, those with gas-guzzling Range Rovers parked outside, to whom an extra few quid means nothing.
To everyone else, in a cost- of-living crisis, it is another slap in the face.
Feet facts
A NEW report claims our feet are much narrower than those of our grunting, loin cloth-wearing ancestors.
Apparently, shoes are to blame, with heel-wearing women particularly afflicted.
I appear to be less evolved.
My ex claimed I had a right club foot like Joseph Goebbels, and my left looks like I’m right at home chasing woolly mammoths.
Which is some comfort.
Phone died on you? Then your life is over
IN last week’s column I bemoaned our increasing reliance on technology – and that, without it, we are becoming ever more caveperson-like.
Sure enough, on Saturday, my crappy, 11-year-old BMW 1 Series key fob died, promptly followed by my iPhone.
The end result?
A £70 Uber and a new £280 car key which I didn’t want.
I just wanted to get into my car, and drive.
You know, like in the olden, days.
Phoneless for two days, I also felt like I’d lost a vital part of my anatomy.
I was unable to travel (my bank cards are all stored on my phone), pay for anything (ditto), email, listen to music, look at dog memes, text, check the weather, pay a parking meter, Google the lyrics to Ernie (The Fastest Milkman In The West) or, well, call anyone.
In short, we have become so symbiotically dependant on technology that we are utterly lost without it.
The cash-carrying elderly, those who don’t swipe to turn the pages in a book and can still use a pen, are increasingly being alienated by our ever-advancing world.
But perhaps, really, they’re the ones who will have the last laugh.
Rubbish rules
A 2021 clip resurfaced on social media this week showing binmen in Pittsburgh, in the US, refusing to carry out a woman’s bags because they were “too heavy”.
The video showed the woman lugging the trash and tipping it into their truck herself as they watched on uselessly.
It says everything you need to know about today’s pathetic health ’n’ safety diktats.
And modern man.
Di’s slapstick platinum
AT long last, the BBC has come up with a genuinely laugh-out-loud comedy.
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Mandy, written and starring the superb Diane Morgan is slapstick platinum.
The third series is here – and if you haven’t given it a whirl yet, do so.
Brilliant.
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Clemmie Moodie
