A COUPLE of months ago I was concerned that bicycle related crime seems to be ignored in March. Recently, a police officer told me the reason; it is not identified as a priority following consultation with residents from March.

A COUPLE f months ago I was concerned that bicycle related crime seems to be ignored in March. Recently, a police officer told me the reason; it is not identified as a priority following consultation with residents from March. Not surprising, this set me thinking.

The police consult with a group of residents to decide priorities in that area. Just for a moment lets consider that this group already have an interest in an unlawful activity, just for the sake of argument lets have a silly example, murder. As a result of consultation with this group of citizens, priorities are set, and murder is not identified as a priority!

There, I said it was a silly example, however, if we replace the word ‘murder’ with say ‘financial self interest’ it becomes not such a silly example but something far more sinister!

Roll on the May 2011 elections.

By the way, congratulations on the excellent article a few weeks ago when Julie Spence ‘debunked’ some of the myths surrounding the absurd and dangerous Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) checks. However may I just correct one small point, CRB checks pre-dated the Soham murders by about 10 years.

GRAHAM McDONALD

High Street

Manea