Police are on high alert across the country. Councillors and police forces have wracked their brains for new ways of dealing with the annual threat to national security. No, not terrorists in this instance, but kids hanging around on street corners.
The summer holidays are cue for a raft of measures to tackle youths’ bad behaviour. Police prepare for groups of young people out on the streets as if for a national emergency. This year, Home Office minister Tony McNulty announced £500,000 in grants for 10 local areas to crack down on teenage criminal damage. Discipline measures range from the heavy-handed – including curfews and dispersal orders – to the frankly bizarre.
On Spiked, Josie Appleton looks at the ways the authorities are trying to keep young people off the streets this summer.
I expect the Tories on Bromley Borough Council to decide to employ the services of the Pied Piper of Hamlyn at some point.
ReplyDeleteSeems far easier than trying to engage young people in interesting and constructive activities.
An interesting and worrying article about how our young people are being criminalised and marginalised for the crime of being young and bored.