CCTV doesn't work

At last what we all thought has been confirmed, CCTV doesn't deter drunken yobs.

Apparently "Graeme Gerrard, head of CCTV at the Association of Chief Police Officers, said that although Britain was now a virtual surveillance state, cameras usually failed to act as a deterrent for drunken yobs.

He told a parliamentary committee that while other countries were astonished at the scale to which Britons were snooped on by the authorities, the evidence suggested CCTV had little impact on levels of late-night violence.

He also admitted the public had been "misled" into believing that installing camera systems would have a big impact on anti-social behaviour.

Around £200 million has been spent on erecting more than four million CCTV cameras across the country over the past 10 years, leading the Information Commissioner, Richard Thomas, recently to talk about "Surveillance Britain".

Ministers have repeatedly stressed the benefits of CCTV on the grounds that they act as a deterrent.

But speaking to the Lords constitution committee, Mr Gerrard, deputy chief constable of the Cheshire constabulary, said: "Most of the pressure [for CCTV] comes from the public.

"Some of them may get disappointed when the CCTV goes in that actually... it doesn't deter most crime. I think they are perhaps misled in terms of the amount of crime that CCTV might prevent.

"Before CCTV can effectively deter people, they need to know the cameras are there. They have got to be thinking about the consequences of their behaviour.

"It is very effective in places like car parks, where offenders are going out to break into cars, and are thinking rationally. In terms of town centres, where a lot of the behaviour is violent behaviour, often fuelled by alcohol, people aren't thinking rationally. They get angry, the CCTV is the last thing they are thinking about.

"Even the presence of police officers doesn't deter the disorder on the street, so cameras are unlikely to deter them."

David Davis, the shadow home secretary, said the Government had undermined civil liberties for no apparent reason."


What a shock... This Labour government have messed so much up over the last nearly 11 years.