More Spy Cameras

The news this morning reporting that the Government plans to let Councils outside London rollout 'Moving Traffic Offence' cameras tells me two things.

First that this Government is more than happy to keep rolling out technology to keep us all in line. It regularly assaults our liberties in other more direct areas, but there is this insidious creeping increase in the monitoring and spying on what we do. How far will this go and who will stop it ?

Second, that the Government has done nothing to tackle badly needed Police reform. Within the Police there is an increasing budget, but increasing bureaucracy. The Police have (rightly) outsourced a number of jobs to lesser paid/skilled civilian jobs and are offloading responsibility for traffic crime to technology, motorway patrols to the Highways Agency, rural policing to District and Parish/Town Councils (knowing the latter are not subject to capping), yet seem to have less and less capability to deal with crime in the way we would expect it, for instance such as by being visible on the street or in Police stations.

Within the force, Police officers complain of imcompetent management and political correctness/risk aversity gone mad. Staffing and pay structure encourage the status quo. Other than trying to force an unecessary amalgamation of certain forces, this Government has offered nothing to try to improve the situation. When will this change ?