Just came across a school minibus on my way into work with no lights on. In the dark, and the rain. And the bus was dark green.
Almost invisible…
You do. Which is why you have to prove you are who you say you are. Otherwise what’s to stop a Russian bot factory wasting government time?
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Or just a disgruntled CFAV wanting to waste the MODs time, by pretending to be 4 different people to get around the costs issues. If the MOD have any suspicion that might be going on, it would be perfectly acceptable for them to ask for ID.
Yes, we do have that right. But it’s totally acceptable for them to be making sure that we are in-fact who we say we are.
I see no issue with people putting in FOIs on What Do They Know and using a fake name. So long as it’s not burdensome. Some of the people on there are putting in more than 1 a week, which is getting towards being malicious. I am saying this as someone who has put in a couple of FOIs in my own name, and also a couple under a pseudonym as I was worried about repercussions. (I’m not just referring to the MOD here)
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How would we know if he’s a tax payer if he’s not using his real name?
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…And how do you know 'He’s ’ a He! 
Also, I’m sure the taxpayer won’t want the taxpayer wasting more money, so it’s right there’s a balance (and to stop people getting around the cost issue).
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GMG: The decimation of libraries.
Libraries are one of the only places in this country that anyone can use recreationally, without the explicit or implicit expectation of spending money. In pretty much any other recreational space, you are expected to part with your cash.
One of my tasks for work right now is to search a specific council area for a location where we can set-up a new centralised delivery hub for the beneficiaries that the charity supports. I won’t name the area.
As part of this, we’ve been looking at properties that the council are disposing of.
So. Many. Libraries!
I don’t lay the blame at the council’s door; this isn’t a council that have issued a Section 114 notice yet, but at central government destroying local funding. Do they not know the impact it’s having on end users and their families, or do they just not care so long as their chums can get paid taxpayer’s money and become lords?
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i guess the issue here is the unlikely use of Basiljet as a genuine surname (a google Search only brings up their FOI requests (seems to be keen on Greta Yarmouth Council as well as the RAFAC) which reaches 12 requests)
I could use Stephen Thompson, and Tom Stevenson as a for instance as a pseudonym which would not get as much attention as “Mr BasilJet”
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£5 per device per month. That’s horrific.
Seeing these things makes me realise more and more why Linus (LTT) is always so against cloud services for this sort of thing, even if they are free. (To start with!)
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Just watched the first episode of to Catch a Copper, so much to grind my gears so little time.
The ineptitude of the IOPC taking 12 months to investigate a Common Assault (which is the actual reason that the file wasn’t passed to the CPS) just drive me mad. They really aren’t fit for purpose, guilty officers going free and innocent officers spending years with their lives on hold.
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I’ve not watched it, but @daws1159 's description reminds me of IHAT.
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The only person ever convicted in it’s seven year existence was one of its own investigators, who was convicted of impersonating a Police Officer…
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It cost £60m.
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Someone I know was accused by IHAT of a war crime. 3 years and 150k’s worth of legal fees later, they accepted that he’d not been in Iraq at the time of the alleged offence - the proof of which he’d provided within 6 weeks of them first contacting him…
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That does sound like the IOPC.
It was something I raised after the Chris Kaba shooting.if someone gets shot outside my house tonight and the suspect gets away clean, generally speaking someone will be identified within days and probably charged within weeks, that’s starting 100% from scratch.
In the case of a Police shooting the killer hands the IOPC the weapon, provides a signed confession and probably body worn video of the shooting, a number of other people will all do the same. All they need to do is check CCTV and take any non-police witness statements. It took them 12 months to get a file to CPS.
If the Police were as inefficient as the IOPC and kept victims/witnesses/suspects with their lives on hold in the same way their would be an outcry and the HMIC would go ballistic,
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Reports in today’s press regarding the Met and vulnerable children, etc. Seems the lessons and events from South Yorkshire (in Rotherham and surrounding areas) and Greater Manchester (in Rochdale and South Manchester) Police forces have passed the Met bye.
Met Police told mother that 14-year-old daughter must report grooming offence herself
Damning report into the sexual exploitation of missing children highlights delays and failures to follow up lines of inquiries
Martin Evans, Crime Editor 9 February 2024 • 7:00am
Related Topics
A 14-year-old girl’s mother who complained to the Metropolitan Police that her daughter was being offered money for sex by an older man was told that the child would need to report the issue herself.
The revelation is made in a damning report, which states the force is not doing enough to protect children from sexual exploitation when they go missing.
Delays, failures to follow up lines of inquiry and poor supervision of cases were all found to be hampering effective investigations into vulnerable youngsters, inspectors found.
Rather than making proactive efforts to find missing children, officers would simply wait for them to turn up, according to the police watchdog.
Inspectors who examined 244 cases of criminal or sexual exploitation graded more than half as inadequate.
Officers dealing with victims of child sexual exploitation were also often found to use language implying that the children themselves were to blame for their abuse.
His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary Fire and Rescue Service found that many officers failed to understand the link between children going missing and them being exploited.
Significant gaps
The watchdog said: “When children go missing regularly, the force’s response is poor. There are also significant gaps in the force’s efforts to help prevent children going missing in the first place.
“Many officers and staff don’t understand the risk and simply wait for them to turn up.”
The report added: “We saw many delays in starting and progressing investigations. We also found many missed opportunities to identify suspects and disrupt their activity, and to carry out evidence-led prosecutions. This is leaving children exposed to risk.”
In one case examined by inspectors a mother who went to police to complain that a man was grooming her 14-year-old daughter and was offering her money for sex was told the child would have to report the offence herself.
The watchdog found that in 33 of 60 cases it examined, officers were found using language that implied the missing children were in some way responsible or to blame for their situation.
In one case a 14-year-old girl was described as “seeking out sex with older men”; a 15-year-old girl was referred to as “engaged in sex work”; and a 12-year-old girl who had been raped was described as “sexually active with older men”.
‘Most vulnerable in society’
Inspectors said: “Worryingly, we didn’t see any evidence that supervisors or managers challenged this language. In fact, in one of our interviews with a detective inspector, they spoke of children being promiscuous.”
Lee Freeman, His Majesty’s Inspector of Constabulary, said: “Children who are at risk of exploitation, or who go missing from home, are some of the most vulnerable in society.
“The police and other public services have a shared responsibility to look for the warning signs, be alert to the risks and act quickly to protect children.
“It is particularly concerning that the Metropolitan Police Service isn’t doing enough when children are suffering from, or at risk of, exploitation.
“The force should make sure that it fully understands the risks to children, and that officers and staff are equipped to identify and tackle those risks effectively, so no child is left unprotected.
Commander Kevin Southworth, the head of public protection at the Met, said: “I’m deeply sorry to the children and families we have let down and want to reassure our communities that we are already taking significant steps to address these recommendations.
“We are putting more police resources into this area and retraining officers to have a better understanding of the complexities of child exploitation so we can continue our work to win back the trust of Londoners.”
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Even scarier is that they are also running their own cadet programs with safeguarding processes aligned to police procedures rather established youth practise.
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You mean like this:
I work alongside one of the Cadet Leaders and from what they describe the processes for camps and stuff are far more restrictive than ours.
The report is merging several unrelated issues which doesn’t help.
This is where the National Detective shortage really hurts the public. These units are chronically understaffed and generally end up full of the newest detectives and being run by the newly promoted supervisors managing caseloads that just aren’t practical. All of which leads to compassion fatigue and a workforce that just wants to leave.
The missing person side, what HMIC are saying isn’t actually practical, they want all missing under 18’s treated as high risk missing people, you can do that in a county where you only have a handful of Mispers. In London all that would achieve would be to have so many high risk missing people that you can’t see the wood for the trees and people who are genuinely out to hurt themselves will get missed.
GMG: Management who can’t take criticism even though they recognise it is valid.
I made a comment in a Teams group earlier this week in reaction to someone else made a complaint that progress on a facility upgrade at work as been slow. I highlighted that the upgrade does appear to be all but ready (lights are on, and the infrastructure is all in place etc) but we’ve had no comms for several weeks to indicate any status update or when the new area goes live - or what might be causing a delay to that despite looking ready.
Today my boss has had a word with me that my comments were not taken well as as a “dig” at the slow progress – when all I was doing was highlighting the comms were poor while indicating progress looks to be 98% there!
My boss recognises I have made a valid point in my comments (which he has seen) but some people who are responsible for the work have taken any negativity I have portrayed as a personal dig at their ability to finish the project, and not simply as a comment that we’re still in the dark as there is no new information for 6 weeks despite the area looking ready for the last 3 weeks!
Erm. 12 months I would say is a good time span from offence to charge these days.
Real example: woman defrauds her employers, they investigate, interview her, she confesses.
File passed to police.
Takes police a year to interview her. The work has been done before they had the file.
Takes police and CPS another year to charge her. She pleads first opportunity, because obvs.
In the intervening period, she joined debtors anonymous, and by the time she was sentenced, she was running the local branch supporting others.
Public interest by now in sending her to custody: 0%
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Sadly I’ve really had to learn the hard way to change the way I say things, especially when what I’m saying is factually correct.
As a project manager working directly with the org’s C-Suite, the learning curve has been exceptionally steep lately. The directors seem unable to see how their actions or omissions directly affect project outcomes.