Published: Saturday, 20th March, 2010 9:00am

Feeble police excuses make me feel very anti-social

by Maurice O'Brien

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ONE can only assume that when it comes to their neighbours, most police officers are blessed with extreme good fortune.

Maybe they get to borrow a Panda now and then to park in the drive, hang their stab proof vest out to dry on the line, or stand a tall hat on the front window sill, lest the local intelligentsia's in any doubt as to who lives there.

Certainly their elderly mums, or disabled relatives, can never have had local yobs ringing the door bell, hurling stones at the windows, playing football in the flowerbeds or spitting foul-mouthed abuse any time they venture out.

If they had, then Chief Inspector of Constabulary Denis O'Connor wouldn't be telling us that one-in-four reports of anti-social behaviour (ie cowardly thuggery) are being ignored by police.

The Home Office says annually there are 3.6million reports of anti-social behaviour.

Mr O'Connor says the true figure is probably double that because victims have learned that reporting it is pretty much a waste of time.

In the main, he says, police do not comprehend how menacing a few bits of paper shoved through a letterbox can be when it's part of a campaign of threats and intimidation.

Nor, seemingly, can they be bothered to find out. Mr O'Connor's sensitive approach to this problem is in stark contrast to police forces which fail to respond to 23% of anti-social behaviour complaints, and the conduct of officers laughingly known as neighbourhood specialists who are apparently unaware of the plight of pathetically vulnerable targets living right under their noses.

The optimism engendered by Mr O'Connor's appearance on Radio 4's Today programme didn't last long.

He was soon being patronised by Sir Hugh Orde, president of ACPO and director of something called the Police National Assessment Centre, who was all for "getting engaged with our partners" and adopting a "cross-agency approach", and our hearts sank at the empty sound of such politically correct cobblers.

He was followed by a nonentity of a Home Office minister I'd never heard of, and hopefully never will again, whose wish is to see "a community taking ownership of the problem". Ye gods!

But it gets worse. This week we hear Thames Valley Police is officially graded "poor" at solving crime.

Responding to this news our fair chief constable informs us: "I am concerned about the grade for solving crime and we have agreed with the police authority that this will be a priority for the next year."

Well, bully for you ma'am. But what other priority could there possibly be?