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Today's unsettling revelation that children as young as 10 are regularly being stopped and searched by police in London raises questions in all directions - some of which need answering far outside the criminal justice system.
Inevitably, there are some who will see the fact that Met officers are frisking hundreds of primary pupils each year simply as evidence of the force using its powers to excess in an unnecessary and harmful manner.
The reality, however, is rather different. Instead, what the figures appear to provide is a further worrying illustration of the way in which a minority of London's children are becoming caught up in crime at an age before their lives have hardly begun.
One result has been the wave of teenage stabbings, shootings and robberies - which has thankfully subsided slightly in recent months - that London has witnessed over the past two years.
Another is cases such as that of the 13-year-old Croydon girl arrested earlier this year after a sub-machine gun was found in her wardrobe and the conviction in January of a 14-year-old from New Cross for possession of a semi-automatic pistol that he was storing for another gang member.
Faced with such problems, the police decision to increase stop and search is understandable, but as officers themselves point out, the long-term solution lies in tackling the underlying reasons why some young children go astray so early in life.
This means addressing the poor parenting and unstable family backgrounds that so many juvenile offenders suffer and ensuring that even the most challenging children receive a proper education - rather than being left to play truant and roam the streets.
Providing positive role models and constructive after-school activities, such as the "Kickz" football sessions run by the Met and the Premier League, could help too.
Without such measures, any police action, however necessary, can only be a temporary solution.
Reader views (1)
"This means addressing the poor parenting and unstable family backgrounds that so many juvenile offenders suffer and ensuring that even the most challenging children receive a proper education - rather than being left to play truant and roam the streets."
Ahhhh - and there's the rub! We're back to that ongoing disjointed, nuclear family destroying, failed though still aggressively indiscriminate multicultural social engineering project over the period of the current government again, aren't we!
The sad thing is that in time people will tire of the next lot, and forget the mess that the socialists have made of Britain - but maybe not. There'll be a whole new breed of majority European socialists making a whole new mess by then, I'd imagine.
- Rogan, Irving, 18/11/2009 04:41
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