Tag: Cambridgeshire Police

Council dithering behind Peterborough’s traveller issue

08:08 Friday 1st August 2014
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

[P]AUL STAINTON: So is Peterborough getting neglected by Cambridgeshire’s police force? Well the city’s MP certainly thinks so. Stewart Jackson told this programme earlier that the Police and Crime Commissioner Sir Graham Bright needs a kick up the backside, and a tougher stance when it comes to dealing with illegal camped travellers. Here are just some of Stewart’s comments.
(TAPE)
STEWART JACKSON: I’m sorry. Graham Bright is paid over £90,000 a year. He needs a good kick up the backside. He very rarely comes to Peterborough. In fact he insults Peterborough by appointing what he calls an outreach worker, as if Peterborough’s a sort of special social case. He needs to come to Peterborough a bit more and talk to people that are affected by this issue.
(LIVE)
PAUL STAINTON: Well the row started when Stewart Jackson criticised Peterborough City Council for not setting up a site for travellers to use. Now a Cross-Party group has been looking into the possible locations where sites could be erected. But after two years, no locations have been made public as yet, although an announcement could be made in the next few weeks. Stewart Jackson says his constituents don’t want more traveller sites. They just want the travellers evicted and punished. Well the man in charge of policing Peterborough Tony Ixer told me earlier that the police can’t evict travellers until they have somewhere to take them.
(TAPE)
TONY IXER: We actually do have a very robust strategy across Cambridgeshire, but it is a fact that it doesn’t cover Peterborough. And the real reason it doesn’t cover Peterborough and hasn’t done for many years is because there are no designated stopping places.
(LIVE)
PAUL STAINTON: So in short, nothing can be done in Peterborough until Peterborough City Council sort themselves out. Needless to say, Sir Graham Bright and Peterborough City Council refused to speak to this programme this morning, but we can speak to Independent councillor John Fox. He chaired the Working Group looking at sites for emergency stopping places in the city. The Group’s recommendations will be considered at the next Peterborough City Council Cabinet meeting. John, good morning.
JOHN FOX: Good morning Paul.
PAUL STAINTON: So it’s your fault that we’re getting these illegal encampments. You’ve been too slow, dragging your feet.
Continue reading “Council dithering behind Peterborough’s traveller issue”

Postal Voting and Electoral Fraud

07:36 Tuesday 11th March 2014
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

[S]UE DOUGAN: Is the electoral system safe from fraud? A BBC investigation has found widespread concern about the potential for fraud around postal voting, which since 2001 has been available to anyone entered on the electoral register. Some parts of the country with a significant sized Asian population are said to be among those communities at risk. Election fraud is something we’re familiar with in Cambridgeshire. In May Peterborough was listed by the Electoral Commissioners as one of fifteen areas with a history of cases of alleged fraud. BBC reporter Allan Urry has been looking into the story. What have you found the Allan? Good morning.
ALLAN URRY: Good morning. Well Pendle for example, in East Lancashire, is a pretty typical example. The concern is that in a few wards within the borough which have communities of people of Pakistani origin, activists are calling at people’s homes and putting undue pressure on families, either to vote for a particular candidate, or likely hand over their ballot paper to be marked by someone else. This is illegal. Postal voting should take place within the privacy of our own homes, but visiting teams of party workers are said to be interfering with that. And we interviewed a Conservative activist in Pendle, Abdul Hussain, who told us what was happening.
Continue reading “Postal Voting and Electoral Fraud”

Home Secretary Orders Inquiry into Undercover Policing

17:26 Thursday 6th March 2014
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

[C]HRIS MANN: A public inquiry is to be held into the way undercover police officers operated during the investigation into the murder of London teenager Stephen Lawrence. It follows a review described by the Home Secretary Theresa May as “profoundly shocking”. More now from our political reporter John Adderley.
JOHN ADDERLEY: Well this will be yet another inquiry relating to the murder of Stephen Lawrence 21 years ago. Two men were jailed for murder, but not until 2012. And this new inquiry, to be led by a judge, follows a review published today into the police investigations into the case. And the Government says that public trust in policing is at stake, and that’s why the Home Secretary has announced the new public inquiry. The review out today finds reasonable grounds to suggest that corruption was taking place on the part of one police officer, and that key evidence about police corruption was subject to mass shredding in 2003. So there could have been more corruption, but the evidence maybe was lost or destroyed. And the review talks about undercover policing. The review found that a Metropolitan Police spy, so called, worked within the wider Lawrence camp. And the review finds this highly questionable.
CHRIS MANN: So John, what’s the reaction been in Parliament?
JOHN ADDERLEY: I think it’s fair to say there was shock on all sides in the Commons as the Home Secretary gave details of the review, and then announced the public inquiry. She said it’s of “the utmost seriousness”, and “of grave concern” to everyone. And it isn’t just about the Stephen Lawrence case, because the revelations about undercover police operations and the extraordinary level of secrecy involved, as the review puts it, the failure to reveal officers’ true identities to court, or to correct evidence they thought was wrong, all that meant according to Theresa May that there is actually the real potential for miscarriages of justice spanning decades.
CHRIS MANN: John Adderley there, our reporter from Westminster.

===========

Stephen Barclay On The Exploitation Of Agricultural Migrant Labour

08:07 Tuesday 1st October 2013
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

[P]AUL STAINTON: As you’ve been hearing this morning, as a result of a BBC Radio Cambridgeshire investigation, four British supermarkets are investigating claims that migrant workers who pick their vegetables in the Fens are being exploited by unlicensed gangmasters. The investigation found that leeks on sale in Waitrose, Marks and Spencer, ASDA and the Co-op had been picked by Eastern Europeans, some of whom claimed to have been threatened and underpaid. Well our very own Jo Taylor has spent the last five months working on this investigation, and I’m pleased to say she joins me now. Morning Jo.
JO TAYLOR: Morning.
PAUL STAINTON: Just remind us what sparked this investigation.
JO TAYLOR: Well we’ve been hearing about this problem for a while. You had Anita on earlier from the Rosmini Centre, but we hardly ever hear from the migrants themselves, the community that’s very hard to get into. So eventually that’s what I went to do, to go and talk to them and find out what was really going on.
PAUL STAINTON: I saw your report on the six o’clock news last night, and it was shocking, some of the things you uncovered.
JO TAYLOR: Yes. It was shocking. What was shocking as well was how widespread some of the things were that I was hearing about. The conditions people, live in, ceilings falling in, mould everywhere. And they’re charged a fair whack for that, fifty pounds a week for the privilege of living in those conditions. Then there was the money people were being left with in their pay packets. Imagine you’re working really hard in the fields all week, twelve hour days. And after the illegal gangmaster’s taken his rent and travel, you’re ending up with twenty pounds. It’s not very much. One of the worst examples, one migrant told me that one week he was left with just forty three pence, which is ridiculous. The other thing that was really shocking to me was the violence I heard about, the having to pay bribes to get that regular work. And if you refused you were threatened with having your personal safety or your life in danger. And these are young people I was speaking to, nineteen years old, twenty years old. They’re far away from home. I just can’t imagine my younger brother for example being in that situation. I would be devastated.
PAUL STAINTON: What have the big supermarkets had to say about what you’ve uncovered?
JO TAYLOR: Well the supermarkets have said that they knew nothing about it. ASDA, Marks and Spencer, the Co-op and Waitrose say they take the allegations very seriously, and they are investigating. They also .. they’re saying this about auditing systems that they have in place, their code of conduct, and the fact that they only use licensed gangmasters.
PAUL STAINTON: Alright. This investigation of course has been making waves. Will it lead to changes for these workers and changes in the way they’re forced to live their lives?
JO TAYLOR: Well I hope so, because the authorities are trying to do something about it. You’ve got the police with Operation Pheasant , where they go into houses of multiple occupancy in the area to check the living conditions, and try and crack down on it in that way. That’s a multi-agency thing. Lots of agencies are involved in that. And you’ve got the Gangmasters Licensing Authority. This is a vast industry. It’s really hard for them to control things. And essentially you need to throw some funding at it.
PAUL STAINTON: Thank you for that Jo. Much appreciated. .. Let’s speak to Stephen Barclay, the MP for North East Cambridgeshire who joins me now. Morning Stephen.
STEPHEN BARCLAY: Good morning.
PAUL STAINTON: What’s your reaction to what Jo’s uncovered? Continue reading “Stephen Barclay On The Exploitation Of Agricultural Migrant Labour”

Tom Lloyd On Prohibition

17:48 Wednesday 3rd July 2013
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

[C]HRIS MANN: The Government has announced that the herbal stimulant khat is to be banned, despite expert advice that it is generally safe to use. Khat, which is chewed, is popular amongst the Somali, Yemeni and Ethiopian communities here in the Uk. Tom Lloyd joins us now, He’s a former Chief Constable of Cambridgeshire of course, and he’s now an international adviser on drugs. Hi Tom.
TOM LLOYD: Hello Chris.
CHRIS MANN: Your reaction? Continue reading “Tom Lloyd On Prohibition”

Asda Wisbech Licence Review Raises Wider Issues

17:48 Monday 20th May 2013
Drive BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

CHRIS MANN: An Asda supermarket in Wisbech has been given a list of improvements to implement to save its alcohol licence. Repeated thefts of booze from the shop, and a stream of violent incidents led Cambridgeshire police to challenge their licence to sell alcohol. Inspector Robin Sissons has more. (TAPE)
ROBIN SISSONS: Well because of the economic climate being as it is at the moment, we’ve seen an increase in shoplifting. Now obviously normally we work in partnership with shops, and we have increased patrols in the shops. We sometimes put crime prevention cars out the front called the Rap car. Or we put literature in the shop and help wherever we can. On this occasion the staff didn’t seem to be willing to engage with the police, and in fact they were doing the opposite. They were really trying to detect crime by challenging people after they’d committed the crime, rather than trying to reduce crime by once identifying a possible offender, saying to them “excuse me, can we help you”, and trying to put them off the crime, rather than allowing them to commit it. So after three or four months of negotiations with the staff, it wasn’t going well, and mediation failed. So in the end we had to call a review, I’m afraid.
CHRIS MANN: So you’re challenging its licence. What happens next? Continue reading “Asda Wisbech Licence Review Raises Wider Issues”

Data Sharing Dr Adrian Boyle

17:13 Tuesday 12th February 2013
Drive BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

NICK FAIRBAIRN: Cambridge has seen nearly a 15% reduction in violent assaults thanks to data sharing. Addenbrooke’s Hospital’s been sharing data with Cambridgeshire Police every month since 2007. Let’s bring in Dr Adrian Boyle, who’s from Addenbrooke’s Hospital, and he’s been involved in this scheme. Evening to you Adrian.
ADRIAN BOYLE: Hello.
NICK FAIRBAIRN: First of all, just tell us how the data’s shared. Is it a case of kind of gleaning info from the patients and passing it on? Continue reading “Data Sharing Dr Adrian Boyle”

Cambridgeshire Police Commissioner Rejects G4S Option

08:07 Wednesday 30th January 2013
Bigger Breakfast Show
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

[P]AUL STAINTON: Cambridgeshire Police along with Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire have now decided to pull the plug on a scheme to privatise some of their services through G4S, that private security company. The Police and Crime Commissioners from all three counties met yesterday afternoon to make that final decision. The plan had been to join with Lincolnshire Police as part of outsourcing plans with G4S, that company that failed spectacularly of course to provide sufficient security for the Olympics. Well Ansar Ali ran in the Police Commissioner election. He welcomed the news, but said he was surprised the Commissioner was even considering it in the first place. (TAPE)
ANSAR ALI: I welcome this decision. During the election campaign I said quite forcefully that G4S wasn’t the right route for delivery of policing services in Cambridgeshire. It would be a disaster for the people of Cambridgeshire, and I’m very very pleased that the three Police Commissioners made this decision. (LIVE)
PAUL STAINTON: Well I’m pleased to say the Police Commissioner for Cambridgeshire Sir Graham Bright joins us now. Morning Graham.
SIR GRAHAM BRIGHT: Good morning to you.
PAUL STAINTON: A bit of an eleventh hour decision. What’s wrong with G4S? Why not? Continue reading “Cambridgeshire Police Commissioner Rejects G4S Option”