Cops and Journos love it so, the happy world of …. statistics !

Now here’s a thing. Police Officer and staff numbers are falling. With regard to staff, quite a lot actually. Leaving warranted officers to carry out the humungous number of tasks and swathes of paperwork previously carried out by support staff / civilian staff / police staff – whatever your force wants to call them today. Either way, a practical, viable, most under-appreciated part of the police ‘family’ has more or less gone; been ‘streamlined’; been cut; been slashed more efficiently than if Sweeny Todd had done it with a brand new razor.

On top of that, police control rooms are being cut, centralised, merged, whatever todays fancy buzzword is, reducing that one piece of the vital link you can’t rent down at Pertemps – local knowledge. Leaving dispatchers staring at a map screen sometimes woefully out of date, trying to guide an officer, also not familiar with the area because the local nick has been closed, as has the next nearest one, to a new estate that’s not actually on the maps yet because they haven’t been updated, where goodness knows what terrible crime is occurring as nothing can be deciphered above the screaming and shouting on the end of the very patchy mobile phone line.

From a frontline officers point of view, many will say crime is not falling, and they are busier than ever. No doubt some of this will be because fewer officers are attending a larger number of incidents, so on an individual basis, they do have an increased workload – some officers say their numbers on response teams have been halved (or even worse) in recent times.

But hang on, the figures show that ‘frontline officer numbers’ have not been cut. in some cases they have allegedly gone up. This amounts to no more than interpretation of that word ‘frontline’ again.

From the guy or girl in the streets perspective, ‘frontline’ tends to mean the number of police available to respond when they call for help, in an emergency or otherwise.

From a ‘police management’ perspective ‘frontline’ also includes other departments that also have a public facing role. Are CID frontline ? Yes …. and No. Are Local Policing Teams frontline ? Yes … and No. Are specialist units (what’s left of them) frontline ? Yes …. and No. It’s all very fudgy. What is clear is that a number of officers from whichever department you select, are spending an increasing amount of time sinking under paperwork and enquiries that previously were carried out by the ever-helpful support staff who are no longer there … but they are still ‘frontline’.

But here’s another thing. Crime IS falling. Despite all this. Despite all the cuts. The Office of National Statistics says so, by an average 7% as well (more here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23354168). And many excited journalists form a variety of newspapers and news websites are happily tippy typing away to spread the good news.

So all is rosy under the apple tree.

Or is it ?

The thing about statistics is this; if you ask the right questions, you get to determine the answers. If you ask the right questions of the right people, you get the right answers. Many moons ago when I worked out there in the real world, I was involved in Marketing for a period, and statistics, or rather, the manipulation of statistics, were a very important part of the role. It was our job to come up with the results that supported whatever argument was being presented. But without of course doing anything underhand.

Say for example, (and this is of course completely hypothetical) you wanted to know if peoples pet cats preferred Brand A or Brand B cat food.

Now what you are not going to do is ask the cats – chances are whichever options you give the answer would be ‘they both taste yuk, give me a mouse or a sparrow any day’. But that won’t give your client the answer they wanted to be able to boldly proclaim their product is the best of the best of the best !

So you have to look for different approaches …. and that tends to involve asking real life members of the public for their views. Now quite what Billy Bloggs knows about the palatable habits of Minky the pet moggie is beyond me and is most likely beyond the capability of the said interviewee (unless of course he has recently been in some sort of erotic encounter with CatWoman and as a result now has the ability to converse in all feline dialects (never say never) !! The cat, for its part, will eat whatever you put in front of it if it’s hungry.

The simplest, proper, scientific way to answer the question would be to carry out taste test on the entire cat population of the UK, (which if you are interested by the way, is estimated at around 8 million) over a period of time to allow for natural fluctuation in feeding habits etc. That approach however, is slightly impractical, if not a tad over the miniscule budget we were given to come up with the right answer … or rather the ‘preferred’ answer, so you have to go to plan B … which involves asking the cat owners.

So you sent some people out onto the High Street with clipboards to stop and harass a large number of poor innocent members of the public going about their daily basis to quiz them on their pets eating habits. of course you don’t !! We can’t waste time and money on anything so random. What you do is have people with clipboards stood outside supermarkets and pet shops, actively (for that read selectively) pouncing on people exiting the said store with boxes/tins of cat food – a credible targeted approach you may say – what’s wrong with that ?

But what if for the four week period before and during the market research, the manufacturer of ‘Brand A’ has been running a national advertising promotion and discounting on their products thereby ensuring sales are increasing and customers are more aware of their brand. Statistically therefore, a large percentage of the buying public will have already purchased their product, AND be in a more positive frame of mind because they’ve seen the happy cat pictures on the telly AND they’ve saved a considerable amount of money on an essential purchase.

Now you ask that person whether their cat prefers Brand A or Brand B – what do you think the answers will be ?

Not very accurate is the correct answer … but on paper Brand A is the bees knees.

But what does that have to do with policing. Well, not a lot directly. But it demonstrates in a clear and simple fashion how statistics cannot be replied on one little bit. There is a very famous phrase, attributed to the 19th-century British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881): “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.”

Further, in a letter to the National Observer published June 13, 1891, p. 93(-94) regarding a debate on pensions (now there’s a thing), the writer says: “Sir,–It has been wittily remarked that there are three kinds of falsehood: the first is a ‘fib,’ the second is a downright lie, and the third and most aggravated is statistics. It is on statistics and on the absence of statistics that the advocate of national pensions relies…..”

It seems that things haven’t really changed with the passage of time. The only people who believe statistics are those that stand to benefit from them.

I digress. back to policing. Yesterday I tweeted “Remember, if you don’t have the staff,you dont do the raid,you don’t find the drugs factory,nothing recorded,so less staff means less crime!”. That got retweeted quite a lot – a heck of a lot actually ! It may be a bit basic or simplistic, but in essence it’s a simple fact – if you don’t know it’s there, it hasn’t happened.

There are all sorts of stories bounding about all over the country about pressures being put on police officers to ‘carefully consider’ the way incidents are dealt with. Now I can’t vouch for the accuracy of any of the comments and I’m sure a lot of officers would not put their head above the parapets for fear of retribution, so let’s just refer to these suggestions as wild, speculative, uncorroborated, unconfirmed rumours :

The Friday/Saturday night drunks, shouting, swearing and being an absolute pain threatening all and sundry, refusing to go home and behave. Locked up Section 5, Public Order Act. EEEEKK !! hang on, that’s recordable as a violent crime. Bad for the figures you know ! In the morning when they are sober, give ‘em a ticket or caution for Drunk & Disorderly. there’s a detection there so the good figures have gone up. AND D&D is not a recordable offence, so the bad figures have gone down at the same time – everyone’s a winner – aren’t they ??

There are some suggesting problems trying to record Attempted Burglaries … “How can you be sure it’s not just a criminal damage to the door/window ?” …. “well they used a flipping lock snapping device for a start !” – “Could it have been kids playing football and the ball has gone through a window ?” … “it’s a ninth floor flat” – and so they go on.

Criminal damage to motor vehicles – “How do we know it isn’t RTC damage from a passing vehicle ?” (again not recordable) …. “erm, the footprints over the bonnet, roof and boot perhaps ?”

There are many, many other examples I’ve been given but again, nothing can be proved – its all rumour, but statistically speaking, what are the chances of all of it being made up ?

So, what have we learnt ? Well, if you want to run a  good news story, or a bad news story, you just need some statistics. The same ones will do – it just depends on how you word it to meet your particular needs. It may well be the case for Brand Y that 54% of people ‘preferred their product’ of the two but if you are marketing Brand Z it’s just as positive to say ‘statistics prove almost half of all people prefer our brand’

By the way, if you are ill or injured, best to go home because statistically speaking you are more likely to die in hospital than anywhere else …. and if its Christmas Day, Boxing Day or New Years day, the statistics say your chances of survival are even lower !!

And here’s a good question for you – why don’t we all drive round in bright yellow cars ?? Statistically they are they safest colour to drive !! (or is it just because there’s less of them about ?) … ohh and don’t buy a red car – statistically you’re more likely to get a speeding ticket ! (but then red is one of the most common colours) (more here http://www.arnoldclark.com/newsroom/124-revealed-britain-s-most-popular-car-colours)

I shall leave you with a quote by another equally famous person “Oh, people can come up with statistics to prove anything. 14% of people know that.” – Homer J Simpson.

Independence Day

Well she seemed all right by dawn’s early light
Though she looked a little worried and weak.
She tried to pretend he wasn’t drinkin’ again
But daddy’d left the proof on her cheek.
And I was only eight years old that summer
And I always seemed to be in the way
So I took myself down to the fair in town
On Independence Day.

Well,word gets around in a small,small town
They said he was a dangerous man
But mama was proud and she stood her ground
But she knew she was on the losin’ end.
Some folks whispered and some folks talked
But everybody looked the other way
And when time ran out there was no one about
On Independence Day.

Let freedom ring, let the white dove sing
Let the whole world know that today
Is a day of reckoning.
Let the weak be strong,let the right be wrong
Roll the stone away, let the guilty pay
It’s Independence Day.

Well,she lit up the sky that fourth of July
By the time that the firemen come
They just put out the flames
And took down some names
And send me to the county home.
Now I ain’t sayin’ it’s right or it’s wrong
But maybe it’s the only way.
Talk about your revolution
It’s Independence Day.

Let freedom ring, let the white dove sing
Let the whole world know that today
Is a day of reckoning.
Let the weak be strong,let the right be wrong
Roll the stone away, let the guilty pay
It’s Independence Day.

Roll the stone away
It’s Independence Day.

 

 

And the beat goes on …..

Below is a re-blog of a post by Carl Eve, reporter for the Plymouth Herald newspaper (@CarlEve on Twitter); originally published on his own blog in December 2012 and reproduced here with his full permission and awareness.

When we think of, talk about, and have a big push on highlighting Domestic Violence, it always seems to be very centric on the two main parties involved. The adults. The grown ups. The ones who the kids look up to.

Yes, and I’m not afraid to say it for fear of being called ‘politically incorrect’ or ‘stereotyping’, primarily an abusive male partner attacking (physically / mentally / emotionally) a female ‘other half’. Before someone jumps up and down on me, I know this is not always the scenario, but it is by far and away the most common.

The point here is, what often gets missed / cast aside / ignored are the child victims – the ones who, if not also being attacked themselves, often have to sit back in silence and see one or other of their parents, their guardians, their role models, being attacked in the most horrible ways possible by someone they should rightly be able to think of as their protector.

So anyway, these are Carl’s words below, not mine. There is nothing I could add. Nothing.

Domestic Abuse Awareness Weeks has been and gone and I didn’t really write anything for my patch. I say this as every year I try to do something to highlight the issue. But as I (repeatedly) say to my contacts in this field, particularly the Plymouth Domestic Abuse Service, “domestic abuse isn’t just for domestic abuse awareness week”.

No-one seems to get my joke, mainly because I say it through clenched teeth. In my old patch of Basildon, I’d be down at the Women’s Refuge, chatting with the manager, staff and current guests about how they are, what they need, what they’re planning, who they’re teaching about DV and how it needs to be countered, which court cases I need to know about and which bigot in the council is trying to give them a hard time.

Here? I’m person non grata, being a) a man and b) a bloody journalist. A combination which assures the view that I’m not to be trusted. So I don’t write as many stories about DV as I’d like.

The irony for me being the Basildon Women’s Aid group had me tagged from the first second. The manager there and outreach workers (most of whom were ‘survivors’ themselves) sussed my background before I’d opened my big gob.

I still recall hearing my mum’s screams. I recall her black eyes, split lip, her fear as the door went and Dad’d come home in one of “those moods” which meant we should all run for cover unless we wanted a piece.

I can’t find any pleasure in playing with Matchbox toys because the metre long track, usually orange, but occasionally the more stiff and unyielding yellow tracks, were not something of fun for me and my brothers. Kept on a little ledge above the fridge, we’d know that if Dad headed towards it, we’d be nursing welts for the rest of the night. I remember almost proudly being able to breathe through an ear after receiving a clout around the ear. I say clout, but that’s rather a quaint old fashioned description. I was playing cricket with a tennis ball with my friend in our garden. The ball hit our back outhouse. Nothing broke, but I was hit around the ear so hard I couldn’t hear the rest of the day and found if I held my nose I could push air out my ear. Strange really.

I had a regular nightmare (at least once a week for several years) of a steaming monster racing up the stairs if I dared venture out of the bedroom to go to the toilet. Only years later I clicked it was about my Dad who, if you heard him stomping up the stairs because me and my younger brother made a noise at night we’d cop a walloping. I remember lying in bed one night, listening to him getting hit and hit and hit, screaming “no, no, no” thinking to myself “if I call out, tell him to stop, I’ll get it too” and hating myself for being a coward.

I got the same feeling of cowardice when I’d hear my mum, in the next room at night, making the same pointless appeal. She’d cry out, begging him to stop. I’d lie there, feeling sick, wondering how breakfast time would be, and whether school would be a kind of freedom.

Like I said, it’s hearing your mum’s screams which I’ll recall for a long while yet.

This went on for years. I didn’t even know it was wrong for a lot of it. I do recall sitting on my bed, in the room I shared with my younger brother. I was about 10, sitting there sobbing after being hit several times. Mum, who’d tried to protect me before I ran, came in and was sitting next to me, also in tears. She’d been hit after she’d stood between me and Dad. She sat, I sat, both crying. I eventually asked her in all sincerity “why can’t we just leave him”. She hugged me closer and after a long pause said: “where can we go? There’s nowhere we can go… I’m sorry”.

Here’s the thing. I know full well it’s all relative and I got off very very light. Since becoming a reporter I’ve made it a kind of point to do stories on domestic violence, or to give it it’s current name, domestic abuse. I’ve heard far, far worse straight from the horses mouth as it were, cases in court, or from officers who’ve attended scenes. Some will make your jaw drop and shake your head. Like the one where the wife is kicked on the ground for daring to answer back, and then the guy got his seven-year-old son to keep kicking mum, so he learned that “that’s what you do to a woman who answers you back”.

One or two have made me well up, particularly when it’s kids because I think back to the fear you feel, all the bloody time. The dread you feel on your way home from school, dawdling so you don’t get home early, hoping he’ll come home in a good mood or there will be Morecombe and Wise or Les Dawson on telly so he’ll laugh in his chair, and we can watch and laugh and we can sit and act like a normal family for half an hour.

I had one of those moments today. I’ve heard this woman’s story from a couple of other people in Plymouth. It was only a few seconds of conversation. I don’t know her name. I was with Kerry Whincup, the co-ordinator for the Plymouth SEEDS (Survivors Empowering and Educating Domestic Abuse Services) for a meeting. Round table, different ages of women, different styles of hair, different outfits, different stories.

She’d come back in after a ciggie and a wee.

She’d left an 11 year relationship on New Years Day. She’d suffered lots of beatings. “After 11 years you leave with what you stand up in”. She has two children. To get at her, to make her suffer, he took a pair of pliers to the children’s teeth.

He’s dead now, and – I am not surprised – she is pretty happy about that.

“You get so used to the daily beatings and everything which goes with it. I didn’t even know what a Refuge was…”

I’ve thought for a while about writing this. About some of my past, why I want to write stories about domestic abuse, why I keep banging my head against some organisations to ensure the message gets out not just one week a year, but as many times as possible.

Meeting her today made my mind up. So bloody brave… and now joined with other victims (okay, survivors for the PC brigade) to help other women, to educate the authorities, the police, the magistrates, the judges, the lawyers, the councillors, the public about why it’s so damned important that this – domestic abuse, domestic violence, ‘another bloody domestic’ as jaded cops sometimes say – should be dealt with, taken seriously, acted upon, spoken about out loud.

Pliers.

I f***ing ask you! Pliers!

And you know the worst thing?

That’s not even the worst story I’ve heard so far, after 13 years as a reporter. Not by a mile. But it still makes me go very, very cold inside.

And also reminds me to call my mum and tell her that I love her because she took a lot of punches for me. So bloody brave…

If you, friends, family, or anyone you know, is suffering from domestic violence, please, please, please contact your local police or one of the very many support groups out there. You are NOT alone. If you can’t face making that step yet, contact me via Twitter, Facebook or email – I’ll do my best to put you in touch with someone that can help, and more importantly support you.

As a footnote, here’s a video clip from someone else, talking about the violence he witnessed his mother suffering as a child