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Police forced to acknowledge flaws

ACAB | 09.02.2011 06:32

The campaign for an independent judge-led inquiry received a boost in the past 48 hours when one of the UK’s most senior police officer’s acknowledged that the current system for deploying undercover officers is wrong. His comments were reported by national publications and broadcasters.

Sir Hugh Orde, head of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) gave a seminar organised by human rights pressure group Liberty yesterday morning. Orde proposed that undercover police officers should require judicial approval before being deployed. You currently need magisterial approval to raid a home, and the Home Secretary’s personal permissions to tap a phone. However, there is no independent oversight required to infiltrate a group or individual, which is possibly a far more intrusive method of intelligence gathering.

While Orde’s comments represent a step in the right direction, they only serve to highlight what an utter disgrace the undercover policing of protesters has been. The revelations that continue to emerge in the international press show a very ugly reality.

But so far we only know snippets of this ugly reality. Many questions remain unanswered. Radical change is required to stop what has happened ever happening again, but first we need the full set of facts to be laid bare. This will only happen through a genuinely independent and wide ranging judicial inquiry.

ACAB

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the view from the other side

09.02.2011 09:21

On a slightly related matter, watch this:

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3sc_prqw_s Footage of a conference/workshop on "The Rise of Street Extremism on 11th Jan (a response to the success of the student protests, and concern about the anti-cuts movement)

Not only does it include footage of a corporate spy (see feature soon) but it has an ex-Police minister admitting that "direct action and violence CAN bring change - unless positive action is taken to stop it", and then explaining how this must be done. The police are now shit-scared of hitting people hard enough to get them to do what they want, he explains, meaning that a line of 3 deep is required where in the late 1990s it would be a single line. Likewise, the Government politicians must "kettle" every issue as it arises, move it to the back-burner and put out the flames: a clear admission of the role of politicians in quelling legitimate anger. He also claims that the "hardcore agitators" do not give a shit about the student fees or the cuts (?!?!?!) as they are only interested in using those affected as cannon fodder to bring down the government, and claims that they are "getting clever" about protest by wanting to get others involved - specifically lorry drivers!

Apart from the lazy stereotyping it is a very interesting experience to see how the real establishment types viwe all of this. The thing that they are most concerned about is that the Government will slip up in their "containment" of the issues, and put their foot in it, rolling out a number of cuts simultaneously and sparking off an issue "that is PERCEIVED to be unfair", which will create the critical mass of protest that will be "exploited" by these agitators to cause unrest. Ignoring his own admission that there are more and more people angry and hurting for every day that the government is in office, what is seen as important is that these people do not make common cause and get on the streets.

You heard the man....

noone

Cynical crap

10.02.2011 20:43

This is just cynical damage limitation by Ordure. They never raid anyone without a magistrate's warrant and when they have one, they have never told the magistrate lies to get it, obviously. And of course they never tap phones without the Home Secretary's authorisation. (Not that direct tapping is common nowadays or very useful to them). Yeah, Yeah. Ordure has spouted this orde mainly for the benefit of the Daily Mail etc. Nobody else will believe it.

Stroppyoldgit