The concept expressed by right wingers Messrs Alan Johnson and Clarke of political independence for the police is breathtakingly naïve (Guardian Comment 14/2/14). And to quote Robert Peel about the police’s ‘operational independence’ and that this ‘consensual approach’ was ditched by the Tories ‘about 10 years ago’ is to elevate naivety to grotesque myopia.
Don’t these gentlemen remember the miners’ strike of 30 years ago. Just to remind them: Mrs Thatcher illegally established a national police force, using the term ‘National Reporting Centre’ as a cover for her brutal objectives. Her lieutenant, union buster coal board chairman Ian McGregor was the cheer leader for
This was followed by the Hillsborough catastrophe when 96 innocent people perished as a result of criminal negligence by those responsible for crowd safety. The subsequent cover-up is now well recorded. The police and the police federation spokesmen collaborated with Thatcher who herself called for the police to emerge blameless. The agencies of the state gelled to lie and shift the responsibility for the tragedy onto the victims. To this day nobody has been brought to book.
The history of the working class is replete with such examples of the forces of the state almost without exception being used as a weapon at the disposal of those with unchecked power.