Brian Paddick's Book

There was a chunk of it in the Mail On Sunday. Here's Brian on his softy-softly policy on dope possession in Lambeth:

"The cannabis pilot certainly seemed to contribute to the crime turnaround in Lambeth. More people were arrested for possession of crack cocaine (up 57 per cent) and Class-A drug-dealing (up 20 per cent), while burglary fell by 18 per cent and street robberies fell from 791 to 407 per month for the period of the pilot, compared with the year before."

Ah, yes, Brian, but can be believe those stats? Teasing aside, though:

"I now believe the whole concept of the PCSO to be flawed. If we have to pay people to be the 'eyes and ears of the police', rather than relying on the public, then something has gone terribly wrong with British policing. We currently have fully trained, fully equipped police officers spending up to half their time performing administrative tasks in police stations while PCSOs patrol the streets. Surely this is the wrong way round. If we could use the money currently spent on PCSOs on keyboard operators doing the admin tasks for regular officers, we could significantly increase the amount of time each police officer spends on the street."

He's still the most compelling candidate on crime.