Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => Politics => Topic started by: TechMan on March 05, 2012, 04:06:57 PM
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/mar/02/police-privatisation-security-firms-crime (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/mar/02/police-privatisation-security-firms-crime)
The breathtaking list of policing activities up for grabs includes investigating crimes, detaining suspects, developing cases, responding to and investigating incidents, supporting victims and witnesses, managing high-risk individuals, patrolling neighbourhoods, managing intelligence, managing engagement with the public, as well as more traditional back-office functions, such as managing forensics, providing legal services, managing the vehicle fleet, finance and human resources.
I see Omni Consumer Products coming to fruition.
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If the state action is outsourced to a private actor, who assuredly gets all those state protections and rights... it... well, kinda goes against the reason all those special rights and protections for state actors existed in the first place.
Just be sure to get yourselves added to the 4th Prime Directive. Much better times than not being there.
{Robocop's classified directive that made employees immune from arrest}
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That's right, when in doubt, blame the whales. =D
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That's right, when in doubt, blame the whales. =D
Okay...okay...okay...I changed the topic.
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deleted by author.
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There is little "private" about this activity. It's more of a subcontracting.
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Policing for profit, what could possibly go wrong?
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"No firearms experience required".
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Surprised to see a thread on this here, but should my opinion on this not already be easy to guess I think this is an awful idea for the following reasons:
i) Its a ten-year (though in reality it is going to be longer since the company involved will already have all the trained staff, all the experience and probably most of the facilities required so its not as if people will be able to outbid them down the line) monopoly that is on offer, not the creation of an actual market in police services.
Such a market could have brought about by allowing the staff in each force (and/or each role within that force) to form their own companies and bid for both their own and other forces contracts, plus of course smaller-scale companies would be much easier for the non-police private sector to set up and compete with the ex-police ones (and easier to fix when either type of company went wrong). If they had done that, then we would be much more likely to get costs down, improve efficiency, innovation and competition generally than this monopoly will be able to.
ii) It wont result in any savings and will probably in fact cost a lot more than it does now - the way the contract is written will inevitably mean that the private company has to rely on the police staff who will be "transferred" from the various constabularies to carry out the work they have contracted for, staff who obviously will have a powerful incentive and the means (since they are mostly unionised, and its not as if many of these roles have an equivalent in the private sector that they can bring people in from to scab) to resist any change in wages, pensions etc being imposed on them by just walking out on strike and causing the system to collapse.
The government has already tried a similar deal with "privatizing" (though again what they in fact did is offered a monopoly to a private firm when the service had previously mostly been provided by private, uncontracted but registered individual interpreters who were only paid for work performed) the Court Interpreter service, which is now costing a lot more than it used to because the interpreters refused to sign up to the new deal - not unreasonably, because their rates were cut by half. As a result, what has happened is that the MoJ now has to pay both ALS and the "rogue" interpreters, otherwise the legal system collapses.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2012/mar/02/interpreters-courts-protest-privatised-contract
iii) Quite a few of the people behind this proposal are very senior ex-police officers, and its only being actively supported by people of the same very senior status. As a result I have a hard time believing that this isnt more about graft than it is about "efficiency".
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American police: "You are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent..."
West Midlands, England police: "Are you being served?"
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I think the Mafia would be interested in placing a bid they can't refuse...
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Don't you just love government?
A government is supposed to be responsible for the security of its citizens first, otherwise there really isn't a legitimate reason to have a government.
Now we have governments across Europe and the US that have a myriad of worthless bureaucratic positions and programs but won't provide the basics- secure borders or secure residential neighborhoods.
When a socialist is facing budget cuts or pressure from his constituents, what does he cut first? The welfare programs? The city's diversity enforcement officer? The free needles for drug addicts and free condoms to grade schoolers programs?
No.
The first on the chopping block is Fire and Police services.
I'm not knocking Great Britain on this either, our country is just about as bad and is following Europe down the same utopian socialist rabbit hole.
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I'm not knocking Great Britain on this either, our country is just about as bad and is following Europe down the same utopian socialist rabbit hole. sewer
FTFY =D
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That's what happens when you spend all your money micromanaging the world...there and very soon here. I'd consider public welfare (all areas of it) to be a higher duty of one's government, than spending trillions on policing the world. Clean up health and welfare after you stop throwing trillions to foreign interests.