1. POLICE SPEND MILLIONS PROTECTING
VIP'S, CUT BOBBIES
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=421531&in_page_id=1770
The Metropolitan Police spent £505 million on VIP
protection and anti- terrorism operations last year - twice
the amount it spent investigating burglaries, sex attacks,
robberies and drug crime. Specialist Operations - which
includes guarding politicians, Royalty and visiting dignitaries,
and all terror-related duties - consumed nearly 16 per cent
of the force's budget in a year that saw the July 7 London
bombings. It was a massive increase of £100 million
on the previous 12 months. The figures show how Britain's
biggest police force is spending ever larger sums of taxpayers'
money on protection and security work. Disturbingly, the
amount spent on routine patrols - the most visible and reassuring
police presence - fell from £331 million to £313
million. There was also a sharp drop in spending on intelligence-gathering,
research and analysis, down from £161 million to just
under £94 million. Nearly £63 million was spent
on cover for sick officers, the time officers took for refreshments
cost £69 million in wages, and £122 million
was spent on administrative paperwork. Astonishingly, a
further £26 million went on ‘checking paperwork’
and £4 million on waiting time unrelated to any crime,
such as officers waiting for equipment or vehicles to be
repaired. The Met's total expenditure for the 12 months
to April 2006 was £3.2 billion - almost a quarter
of the national policing bill. Norman Brennan, director
of the Victims of Crime Trust, said: ‘These figures
show that a disproportionate amount of money is being spent
on operations like guarding VIPs, which should be funded
by the Government. ‘Crimes such as burglary and rape
have a devastating effect on victims.
The public want to see officers patrolling the streets and
catching criminals. That is where resources should be concentrated.’
The Met's Specialist Operations department includes an elite
Special Escort Group of 50 motorcycle outriders who whisk
anyone deemed a security risk through the London traffic
at high speed. Scotland Yard refuses to discuss its secret
list of people judged worthy of such treatment. But there
was surprise earlier this year when this newspaper revealed
that two Range Rovers and six outriders had been assigned
to escort a fleet of limousines taking the King of Bahrain
and 70 guests to the Dorchester to celebrate his son's graduation
from Sandhurst. A Scotland Yard spokesman said last night:
‘As well as protecting our citizens, investigating
crimes and delivering local policing, the Metropolitan Police
also have capital city functions that bring national and
international responsibilities. This does not detract from
our ability to fight crime.’ A spokesman for the Metropolitan
Police Authority, which supervises the force's budget, defended
the millions spent on form-filling. ‘The Met is the
largest single employer in London and this cost reflects
the operational feat involved in running an organisation
on that scale,’ he said.
2. ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS
A BOBBY ON THE BEAT - LITTLEJOHN
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/columnists/
dailymail.html?In_article_id=421972&in_page_id=1790
Like young Mr Grace in Are You Being Served? Metropolitan
Police Commissioner Ian Blair tells his troops: 'You've
all done very well.' As Richard Kay reported yesterday-Blair's
Christmas message paints a picture more rosy than a robin's
red breast. 'We are seeing significant rises in public confidence
and falls in almost every type of crime and so the early
signs are good,' he writes. George Bush should have chosen
Ian Blair to chair the Iraq Study Group. He'd have been
guaranteed a glowing report of unqualified success, peace,
harmony and gratitude. Maybe the view from Blair's ivory
tower at Scotland Yard is as insulated from harsh reality
as the Green Zone in Baghdad. But you'd be hard- pressed
to find anyone else in London who agrees with him –
including most of those who work for the Met. Only a few
months ago 24,000 officers belonging to the Metropolitan
Police Federation passed a motion of no confidence in their
commissioner and called for his immediate resignation. Perhaps
it's no coincidence that wherever young Mr Grace went, he
was accompanied by two strapping nurses.
Blair's self-congratulatory, seasonal state-of-the-nation
is a model of delusion and the same kind of hubris which
led him to announce in August that the capital was now so
safe that householders could leave their front doors open.
That little gem was greeted with howls of derision and disbelief
from Cockfosters to Croydon and from Ilford to Isleworth.
Let's overlook the bungled Forest Gate terror raid and the
continuing shenanigans over the shooting of Brazilian Jean
Charles de Menezes. In both cases, I've been prepared to
give the Met the benefit of the doubt. But what about Blair
taping his phone calls with the Attorney General, or his
crass remarks over the murders of Holly Wells and Jessica
Chapman?
Then there was the attempt to prosecute writer Lynette Burrows
and the former Muslim Council leader Sir Iqbal Sacranie
for 'hate crime' over a few disapproving remarks about homosexuals.
Oh, and the announcement that the rabid demonstration outside
Westminster Cathedral by Islamic nutters calling for the
Pope to be beheaded was 'peaceful'. This year, despite his
devotion to 'diversity', Blair has managed to fall out with
Brian Paddick, the Yard's most senior gay officer, along
with the black and Asian police association. Over the weekend
it emerged that the Met now spends twice as much on anti-terror
operations and protecting dignitaries as it does investigating
burglaries, sex attacks, robberies and drug crime. That's
not entirely Ian Blair's fault - the Government should be
picking up the bill for diplomatic protection and terrorism,
not the taxpayers of London. But we can question his sense
of priorities. While £122 million was spent on paperwork
- and another, astonishing, £26 million 'checking
paperwork' - the number of bobbies on the beat has actually
fallen. The amount spent on routine patrols has been cut
by £20million. That doesn't surprise me.
Sightings of coppers on the street are as rare as snowflakes
in July. Last Friday night, I decided to conduct my own
survey. On the way home from supper in the West End, we
decided to have a 'Spot The Plod' competition to pass the
time. It was just after 11pm and the streets were thronged
with people tumbling in and out of pubs and clubs. Our 20-odd
mile journey took in Piccadilly Circus, parts of Mayfair,
the Gloucester Road, a swathe of Kensington, Bayswater,
Paddington, Swiss Cottage, Hampstead and points north. We
didn't see a single copper. Not one. None. Nada. Not even
a pair of Blunkett's pretend Plods. Not a solitary marked
patrol car. I know that once this column appears, I'll get
letters and e-mails from hard-pressed duty inspectors -
not just from London but from all over Britain - telling
me how they are expected to police large areas with just
a handful of officers and that once they make an arrest
they're off the beat for hours. Across the country there
is what it has become fashionable to call a 'disconnect'
between policing priorities and those of the public they
are paid to protect. I could fill this column week in, week
out with examples. For instance, in Derbyshire, it has been
revealed that police failed properly to investigate a violent
robbery which led to the murder of riding instructor Tania
Moore because they were too busy looking into a case of
stolen chickens. The one officer assigned to the baseball
bat attack on the young woman was pulled off the inquiry
to join 40 others, including a team dressed as painters
and decorators, staking out a poultry plant owned by a prominent
local dignitary. In Henley-on-Thames, a businessman was
beaten to death in front of the police station, without
apparently attracting the attention of those officers sitting
snugly inside.
Yet everywhere, politically-motivated prosecutions are pursued
with zeal, while other, more routine crimes are ignored.
WHO can forget the activities of the golliwog squads in
Herefordshire and West Sussex, who threatened to arrest
under the public order act toy shop owners for selling gollies?
Worthing police said hunting down those trading in 'threatening,
insulting and abusive' cuddly toys was a 'priority'. Last
week, some soppy WPC warned a man carrying a cricket ball
on the Tube that he could be charged with possessing an
offensive weapon. But if you're burgled or robbed, the best
you can expect is a note for the insurance and the offer
of victim support counselling. Cheshire Constabulary actually
employs a 'Demand Management Unit Manager' to write to robbery
victims telling them why their cases won't be investigated.
And don't let's even start on the Mad Mullah of the Traffic
Taliban. By and large, I don't blame the poor bloody infantry.
The parlous state of policing in Britain today is the fault
of meddling politicians and chief constables anxious to
ingratiate themselves with the Guardianistas at the Home
Office. If Ian Blair, Britain's most senior policeman, really
believes that he's doing a great job and that he enjoys
the full confidence of the public, it's not young Mr Grace's
nurses he needs, it's two burly men in white coats. Mind
how you go.
3. NHS FINANCES IN CHAOS
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/publicservices/story/0,,1970029,00.html
The head of the NHS in England admitted yesterday that its
accounting system was ‘unsustainable and inconsistent’,
forcing the weakest hospital trusts into a vicious cycle
of spiralling deficits.
David Nicholson, the NHS chief executive, did not dispute
reports in the Guardian that used data obtained under the
Freedom of Information Act to show how at least a dozen
trusts were in an irrecoverable financial predicament. He
said the accounting system had to change, but the Department
of Health could not afford the £600m cost of repairing
the damage the system had already caused. It might have
the resources to do so in 2007-08 if the NHS managed to
break even at the end of the current financial year. He
said he was ‘absolutely confident’ it would avoid
another deficit. His comments came as the Heart of England
foundation trust, with hospitals in east Birmingham and
Solihull, prepared to announce plans today to take over
the financially troubled Good Hope hospital in Sutton Coldfield.
The merger would create one of the biggest hospital trusts
in England and is seen as a model for rescuing other hospitals
from a cycle of deficits. Mr Nicholson published the priorities,
targets and rules that will govern all NHS organisations
for the 12 months from April. They include plans to achieve
a £250m surplus by March 2008, while increasing hospital
activity to make a dramatic reduction in waiting times.
He said: ‘There will be no let-up in the pace ... and
I make no apologies for being ambitious on behalf of patients
and taxpayers.’ But the fragility of the NHS's finances
was highlighted by his admission that the health service
cannot operate well under the system of resource accounting
and budgeting (Rab) imposed on it in 2001. He said: ‘The
way in which Rab is applied to NHS trusts, although providing
a strong disincentive to overspend, will become increasingly
unsustainable as we move forward with the programme of reform.’
Under the Rab rules, a hospital trust making a deficit in
one financial year has the amount deducted from its income
in the following year. But it is also under a statutory
obligation to make a surplus to compensate for the deficit.
Mr Nicholson said this double penalty was ‘inconsistent’
with the principles of the government's strategy for paying
hospitals a fair price for the number of patients they treated.
He accepted the logic of recommendations from the Audit
Commission to exempt trusts from the Rab regime, but said
it would cost £600m to pay off the trusts' Rab debts.
This would have to come out of the department's budget for
treating patients and could only be afforded after NHS trusts
proved they had financial discipline. Mr Nicholson did not
dispute the assertion in yesterday's Guardian that the Rab
rules have forced 13 trusts into an irrecoverable financial
position. But he said it was wrong to describe them as ‘technically
bankrupt’ because they were public sector organisations.
Gill Morgan, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, which
represents the trusts, said: ‘We are very disappointed
the department has not taken the opportunity to revise the
NHS accounting rules.’ Niall Dickson, chief executive
of the King's Fund, a health research institute, said: ‘The
quest for financial balance must not come at the expense
of patient care.’ Doctors and nurses' leaders said
the plan to achieve a £250m surplus in 2007-08 implied
cuts in jobs and services. Jonathan Fielden, chairman of
the British Medical Association's consultants committee,
said: ‘Operations are being delayed, jobs are being
frozen and trained doctors and other healthcare staff are
struggling to find jobs, while the NHS attempts to get its
finances sorted. ‘Meanwhile, NHS money is being siphoned
into the private sector through generous, guaranteed contracts
to provide care for NHS patients.’
4. DOZEN HOSPITALS BANKRUPT
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/foi/story/0,,1969661,00.html
At least a dozen NHS hospital trusts are technically bankrupt,
with no chance of meeting a legal obligation to balance
their books, a Guardian investigation has revealed. Data
provided by the Department of Health under the Freedom of
Information Act showed 103 hospital trusts across England
expect to end the year with accumulated deficits of £1.6bn,
caused by overspending since 2001. Many are taking corrective
action, including laying off staff, closing wards and reducing
the time patients spend in hospital. But the Guardian has
identified a group of trusts that have passed the point
of no return.
Patricia Hewitt, the health secretary, is expected to announce
changes in the NHS's accounting rules today. If they do
not address the problem of accumulating deficits, the trusts
will ruin her chances of restoring financial equilibrium.
The group in greatest difficulty includes Queen Elizabeth
hospital in Woolwich, south-east London, which is on course
to overspend by £37.1m this year after racking up
deficits totalling £28.3m over the previous two years.
This would bring its cumulative deficit by the end of March
to £65.3m, equivalent to 56.9% of its turnover. Like
every other hospital and mental health trust, the Queen
Elizabeth has a legal obligation to balance the books over
three years, stretching in exceptional circumstances to
five. But to do so it would have to generate surpluses of
£65.3m. Its senior executives have convinced the DoH
that they have absolutely no chance of doing so. Other trusts
with irrecoverable positions include Surrey and Sussex Healthcare,
Hinchingbrooke in Huntingdonshire, Ipswich, North West London
and West Hertfordshire.
Their financial difficulties became impossible to manage
due to a mistake made by the DoH and the Treasury in 2001,
when they put NHS trusts under a financial regime known
as Resource Accounting and Budgeting (RAB). The Guardian's
analysis used information from thousands of spreadsheets
supplied under the Freedom of Information Act. The new system
was designed to regulate spending by Whitehall departments,
but had a devastating effect when it was applied to overspending
hospital trusts. If a trust spent £105m, but had an
income of only £100m, it would end the year with a
deficit of £5m. The new rules sliced £5m from
its income in the following year and obliged it to make
a £5m surplus. That required the trust to cut its
spending from £105m to £90m. Trusts faced with
this triple whammy could not achieve the target without
damaging patient care and so their deficits escalated. The
rules were described last night by one NHS finance director
as ‘a nightmare from Alice in Wonderland’. Ms
Hewitt asked the Audit Commission to investigate the problem.
It told her in July: ‘We consider the RAB regime should
not be applied to NHS trusts.’ She is expected to change
the accounting rules today when she announces the financial
objectives for the NHS in 2007/8. Her officials debated
with the Treasury last week how to eliminate the worst features
of the system without giving the impression that the government
has gone soft on NHS deficits.
Ms Hewitt has been under strong pressure from trusts to
scrap the accounting rules. Nigel Edwards, policy director
of the NHS Confederation, said the trusts identified by
the Guardian as being under extreme financial pressure were
being pushed by the accounting system ‘into a position
where recovery looks extremely difficult, if not impossible’.
He added: ‘Financial recovery would imply such damage
to patients that no sensible person would go for it. They
would not compromise the survival of the people they serve.’
