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Shocking failures
• AS we all come to terms with the shock and outrage over Ben Kinsella’s death, the latest revelation that the murderer of Martin Dinnegan had “lowered” supervision is deeply troubling.
That Joseph Chin’s curfew had been lifted and his electronic tag removed was just downright shocking. These are the most basic monitoring devices used on those who have entered the criminal justice system and are deemed “at risk” of re-offending.
A recent Home Office report highlighted flaws within the council’s system, such as staff not being trained properly and that parents and carers were not properly assessed. Why were alarm bells not ringing? And why did the Lib Dems in charge not act?
Surely, it is also their job to work with police and youth offending teams to ensure these faults were flagged up as a priority and dealt with immediately. I can’t imagine that Lib Dem councillors did not read a Home Office inspection report about an important council service.
This further proves, as if we didn’t know already, that the Lib Dems don’t take crime seriously and are completely weak in tackling it. The Lib Dems failed to act upon this and a young life was lost tragically and so unnecessarily.
This failure by the Lib Dem-run council cannot be ignored. In order to improve the current flawed system we need an independent, rigorous, fully transparent, no-holds-barred inquiry into this flawed council service.
Stricter criteria must be set in place, processes and procedures must be tightened up and a more robust monitoring system needs to be embedded.
The quicker Councillor Terry Stacy gets his act together and authorises this inquiry the better for all of us determined to play our part in tackling this problem.
TROY GALLAGHER
Bunhill Labour
Chairman, Bunhill Safer Neighbourhood Panel
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