English Yokel

Isn't the British Bobby wonderful!

Yokel had a conversation with a colleague who had driven "Up North" one day, attended to a small amount of business that required his attention in person, and then travelled back "Down South" the next. Half way back he pulled into one of these roadside services areas (it was an A road, not a motorway) and he was followed in by a car that turned out to be an unmarked police car. The officer got out of his car and came over. He pointed out that the colleagues rear number plate was not legible. Too true given the mileage he had done in the course of the day and a half, and the amount of salt that the Highways people had been busy throwing on the road. Ah but, countered the copper, look around this car park, none of the other vehicles are so obscured. Thanks for telling me, I'll sort it out. No, says the copper, I think we'll sort this out properly, don't you? And out came the penalty tickets, £30 payable in 28 days.

Pause for a moment and reflect on another incident, this time in India. Yokel travelled there on business, and one of his contacts turned out to be a keen rider of motorbikes. He always kept a largish US dollar bill in the top pocket of his leathers. Why? When you get stopped by the traffic police, whatever defence you've got to the initial reaason they say they stopped you for, there's always another thing to get you on. So he had to resort to the Indian way of dealing with these matters.

Is that what the UK police system is trying to develop? Not necessarily the officers, but their managers, and the politicians who drive them. They seem to be working towards a policy of arrest you for anything, punish you for everything, all automatically driven by computers and targets. Given that decriminalised parking enforcement Parking Wardens are said by some to be on commission, this is one of those situations when Yokel doesn't want to sit and think!

So back to Yokel's colleague in the service area, smarting from a £30 ticket. Oh says the copper: no conviction, no points on your licence, so thats OK then. But seeing as how you have just committed a moving traffic offence, he continues, I am now permitted to require you to take a breath test. It is the season for such things isn't it, he smarmed. Even when Officer Plod could see that the reading was zero, he still kept on trying to keep Yokel's colleague on edge, real pantomome comedian's timing, it seems.

And then they wonder why the middle classes, normally law abiding folk, are becoming alienated. Its not just the arrogant attitude in this episode, but also things like the DNA database, the obtrusive references to Criminal Records Bureau at every opportunity, and the political correctness that forbids them from catching real criminals. Yokel had better go away and just sit for a while before his apoplexy takes hold again.

Picture credit: BBC