UK riots: ‘Absolutely, we can cope with this’, says Chief Constable

Krishnan Guru-Murthy spoke to Chief Constable BJ Harrington, Public Order lead for the National Police Chiefs’ Council.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Can the police cope with this as it carries on? We’re more than a week in now.

BJ Harrington: Good evening. Absolutely, we can cope with this. We’ve seen abhorrent violence across the country, in towns, in cities – people destroying communities, attacking communities and attacking police officers. It’s not acceptable. You said yourself in this report tonight, over 400 arrests, over 120 people charged and brought to court and convictions already, whether people have been abusive online, inciting hatred or indeed attacking communities and causing damage. Yes we can – we’re prepared this evening. Thousands of officers across the country, specially trained riot officers are ready to deal with all the disorder, but also community officers out in our communities, working with them to make sure they feel safe and that they are safe.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Even our producers on the ground are saying that they’re starting to recognise certain faces. I’m sure the police are doing the same. So how much more intelligence is there now? In terms of intercepting what’s going on?

BJ Harrington: We’re out on the ground at over 100 events that have been discussed this evening, and of course, where there is disorder we’ll be there. We’re using intelligence, we’re using information, and we’re gathering evidence. Whether that’s from online sources, the internet, and of course, social media, whether that’s video and CCTV cameras, whether it’s drone footage and the body-worn footage of officers on the ground. So we’re using that. We’re bringing convictions and I think there’s been no shortage of arrests. When you compare that with 2011, I think we’ve been much more fleet of foot. And of course, with the support of the courts and the Crown Prosecution Service, we’re bringing people in front of the courts and they’re getting convicted.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: How many people do you think are taking part in this?

BJ Harrington: That’s difficult to say. You’ve seen from the media coverage and from the footage across the country that in some places it’s large numbers – and sometimes it’s small amounts of people who are congregating and attacking the police. And we’ve seen some huge success. But I also want to stress that we’ve seen some changes. If you look at Southport, following the tragedy of those little girls being killed, they’ve taken a different approach now. Of course, we’ve seen communities coming together and working with the police to say that actually it’s ‘not on in our community’. I want to thank those communities that are doing that. In Birmingham, we’ve seen people protesting and those in a mosque sharing food. So there is a huge amount of cohesion going on. And of course, for the officers – the police officers who are out there – you’ve seen their bravery, you’ve seen the things they’ve been doing, and they’re out there. They are there to protect the communities and they care about these communities, unlike some of the people who perhaps, from far afield, are online trying to stoke up disorder and violence.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Do you think you need to do more, as forces, to explain your policing tactics in individual cases? You know that there’s a huge amount of misinformation going on about two-tier policing, which is a phrase that’s kind of just blown out of nowhere in the last couple of weeks. In the past, two-tier policing might have meant people making accusations of police racism. Now it’s kind of gone the other way, that you’re being accused of policing white gatherings more harshly than anti-racist protests. How are you going to tackle that? Because a lot of people clearly believe it, whether it’s true or not.

BJ Harrington: We police without fear or favour and where people come out on the streets, they want to come out and protest and they’re peaceful and they’re lawful – policing will and has always facilitated that kind of activity. It’s an important part of our democratic society. However, as we have seen in the last week, where people come out to destroy their community, to damage libraries, to smash up shops, to overturn cars and to attack police officers, then that’s not two- tier policing. And we will act, we’ll make arrests, we’ll go forward, as you’ve seen officers bravely doing, and we’ll put those people in front of the courts. That’s about policing firmly and dealing with criminality.