Policing - new material (93)
01 April 2011
Facilitating Peaceful Protest. Joint Committee on Human Rights 22.3.11, (HL Paper 123, HC 684), pp. 44. The report includes evidence to the Joint Committee on the policing of recent protests and preparations for the Trades Union Congress (TUC) march which took place on 26 March. It expresses concern “about kettling and the use of batons: clearer operational guidance is needed on both of these if the police are to meet their commitment to human rights successfully.” It also observes that: “there appears to be no specific guidance setting out the circumstances in which the use of the baton against the head might be justifiable”, and expresses surprise at this situation. On the controversial use of undercover police officers in peaceful protest movements, it states: “we asked the Metropolitan Police to confirm that undercover police officers are not being used in the trade union movement. The response to our questions was that the Metropolitan Police are “not in a position to confirm or deny what level of undercover officers will be deployed in the event.” The report is available at: http://www.statewatch.org/news/2011/mar/uk-jhrc-report-facilitating-peaceful-protests.pdf
Surveillance Equipment, Mike McBride. Police Product Review Issue 42 (April / May) 2011, pp. 27-29. This article reviews new products for police surveillance of public activity covering direct surveillance (optical equipment, thermal images, passive millimetre-wave scanning and combinations of these technologies), Tracking (RFID devices – “As these devices are used on authorised covert operations it would be improper to disclose more information about the here.”) and Electronic Eavesdropping (electronic listening devices (bugs) and spycams for transmitting audio and video covertly).
European Police Science and Research Bulletin Issue 4. European Police College (Winter 2010/2011) pp. 27. The edition of the quarterly journal of the European Police College contains two particularly interesting articles. The first deals with a training programme in Denmark that “is designed to enhance the policing of major events [where] an approach [is] developed from the latest knowledge on the social psychology of crowds and police good practice”. The dominant approach is now based on the idea that crowds adopt “social identity”, through which “peaceful crowd members become collectively ‘violent’ where they find the actions of police illegitimate”. Thus, “there is an increased likelihood of perceptions of police illegitimacy emerging among crowds in situations where the police have not been capable of conducting ongoing and dynamic risk assessments”. This necessitates the need for increased dialogue between police and crowd, with research suggesting that “the extent to which police can achieve the proportionate use of force and maintain perceptions of police legitimacy among crowds is increased through dialogue and communication”. The Danish East Jutland Police Force has adopted some of the findings of the research and associated training programme. The second article is entitled ‘Police Versus Civilians – Growing Tensions in the Dutch Public Domain 1985-2005’. It concludes that both civilians and police have “different perception[s]” of what constitutes proper behaviour. While “civilians...do not tolerate officers who immediately proceed to issue citations, make arrests, or take similar actions”, the police “attempt to demand respect through decisive action [and] have become quick to adopt an authoritarian or dominant attitude”. Available at: http://www.cepol.europa.eu/index.php?id=science-research-bulletin