MAIL COMMENT: Enough digging, now get us out of this hole

No fair-minded person could hold the Government wholly or even principally responsible for our economic woes.

What is indisputable, however, is that ministers' behaviour this summer has made Britain's plight even worse.

First, Downing Street floats the vague possibility of a stamp-duty holiday for homebuyers at an unspecified future date.

Result? Our already stricken housing market comes juddering to a near standstill, with mortgage approvals down a staggering 70 per cent on last year.

Next, Chancellor Alistair Darling batters confidence by announcing that Britain faces its toughest economic crisis in 60 years - and, as inevitably as night follows day, the pound comes crashing down against the dollar and the euro.

Now Schools Secretary Ed Balls digs a deeper hole for our economic prospects by saying the global financial position is the worst since the 1930s.

Why this concerted effort to talk the crisis up - and Britain down?

An ugly suspicion arises that the Government's spin doctors are hoping to convince us our problems are so serious that only Labour has the experience to cope with them.

If so, they should stop playing politics and get on with rescuing us from a predicament at least partly of their own making.

After all, wouldn't we be much better placed to weather the storm if it hadn't been for reckless Government spending during the boom years?

Today, ministers unveil the first instalment of their rescue package, announcing measures to help struggling homeowners and first-time buyers.

If this Government is to survive, they had better work - and work fast.

For taxpayers are heartily sick of footing the bill for Labour's mistakes.

Blindingly obvious

There are many reasons why Britain has become a nation of 'passive bystanders', in which only four out of ten say they would intervene to stop a group of teenagers from vandalising a bus-stop.

Top of the list, surely, is the fear of being attacked - alas, all too real at a time when increasing numbers of young thugs carry knives or even guns.

Then there's the risk of have-a-go heroes being prosecuted for so much as lifting a finger against a criminal.

But the Reform think-tank may also be on to something when it blames remote, target-driven policing for making ordinary citizens believe it's none of their business to help their local force keep law and order.

As the group says: 'If the face of British criminal justice was once George Dixon of Dock Green, the new face might be the Robocop of Detroit's fictional future.'

The question is: what should be done to make the police more approachable and the public feel more engaged?

Certainly, there is much to be said for Reform's idea of police chiefs directly answerable to local voters. But some of the group's other proposals - such as giving the public access to more detailed 'crime maps' and publishing details of activities in local prisons - seem wildly off-target.

No. The real answer to bringing back Dixon of Dock Green is far simpler.

We need many more police on the beat - not the cut-price 'Blunkett's Bobbies' favoured by Home Office mandarins and our gaffe-prone Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, but properly trained officers who know their patch and the people on it.

Yesterday, Police Minister Tony McNulty dismissed as 'blindingly obvious' a leaked Home Office document warning that Britain's economic downturn may lead to a crimewave.

Isn't it equally blindingly obvious that we need more visible policing to deal with it?