This week’s ‘Scum of the Week’ Award goes to two airport cleaners, Anthony Currant, 65, and Abdul Hussain, 30 whose day job included nicking the contents of travellers’ luggage during shifts at Luton Airport.

Bedfordshire Police investigated after a large number of thefts from luggage were reported. They installed hidden cameras which captured the low-life’s patting down bags they diverted from the main carousels into a room where no other staff were about.  Once bags were identified as having likely goodies inside, the thieves opened them, stole the contents & replaced them back on the carousels where the bags were fed through to the owners.

The pair targeted cigarettes & tobacco, cash & electrical items such as iPods & cameras.

During the investigation police discovered over £30,000 in cash at the thieves’ homes, together with thousands of cigarettes (which they were selling to co-workers), electrical goods & jewellery.

The cleaners have been jailed for six & three months & sacked from their jobs.

]]> http://200weeks.police999.com/archives/3162/feed 0 http://200weeks.police999.com/archives/3157 http://200weeks.police999.com/archives/3157#comments Wed, 28 Jul 2010 22:22:06 +0000 200 http://200weeks.police999.com/?p=3157

Theresa May has been a  busy girl, what with dismantling all the crap we’ve had to put up with under the labour administration.

Hardly a day goes by without another announcement on what she is doing away with. One could be forgiven for thinking she was hell bent on world domination & the destruction of everything that has gone on before.

Wait a minute, does anyone else notice the similarity?

Motorists, or a large proportion of motorists, will no doubt be celebrating the news that the new financial measures will mean speed cameras may go.

The new government is flashing 40% off the funding bill which may cause authorities to withdraw cameras from service.

Oxfordshire council is considering the removal of some or all of its 79 cameras. Devon, Cornwall, Northamptonshire & Somerset are also considering the removal of equipment.

The budget cuts amount to a saving of £38million a year.

Of course, views will be split on the issue. Supporters say this can only lead to an increase of deaths on the roads, while others see it as an effort to show less importance on relying on the motorist as an easy target for tax-dollars; it is estimated that speed cameras bring on £100million a year into the exchequer.

Having written this earlier today I saw on the 6 O’clock news that the AA are saying their last survey of 15,000 members found that nearly 70% of them were happy with speed cameras. So perhaps people really will be annoyed if the cameras disappear. I don;t think I’m one of them though.

I am a firm believer that if you have a problem with something someone has done, you speak to that person about it, if you’re that concerned. Invariably, disagreements are pretty trivial & 8 times out of ten I’ll just let it ride.

So it was quite uncomfortable as I thought about the complaint this person was making. It was someone from another shift – we overlap sometimes & you have to work with another shift for a couple of hours now & again. I wondered whether they’d complain about one of their own controllers, or was it a case of it’s easier to complain about someone you don’t know, or is it that it is easier to sort out with someone you do know?

Then I got to thinking, well fuck you, if you’re gonna complain about that, then I’m gonna make a note of all the times you fuck up or fail to do something ‘by the book’.  In the next 90 minutes 5 of the 8 crews had breached policy on at least 1 occasion each, nothing major, but rules that have been put in place to make either my job, their job, or the public’s expectations easier to fulfill, if not less dangerous for themselves or their colleagues.

I didn’t make a note of them. I like to think I have a life. Just don’t expect me to cut the same slack I cut to everyone else. Knobber.

First we had Gadget & today PC David Copperfield, he of the original police blog & immigrant to the Canadian Police.

He writes today in the Telegraph about how policing in his new force compares to policing in the UK, and it doesn’t stack up very well for the UK system. He espouses the fact that comparatively, the Canadian Police do better with less than the UK police, but then anyone with any knowledge of policing in this country will be well versed in what treacle-heavy systems we have over here, where money is wasted hand-over-fist on counting what is done rather than actually just doing it.

Head on over & take a look, it’s nothing that we’ve not been saying for years.

How come work gets in the way of real life so much? It seems I never have any time to do the things I want or need to be doing. The amount of stuff I can’t do these days just seems to increase with every month.

We’ve been going through some major reworkings of  Weeks Towers this year & while we are in a position to pay little men to do the work, whereas years ago I’d have done it all myself, there is still so much I need to do to prepare for the arrival of the little men.

We’re having a major refit upstairs which will mean that the loft needs to be cleared above one of the rooms so the electrician can get in & work his magic. The thing is there is more stuff in my loft than there is in my house. It’s not just a case of moving a few boxes around.

Mrs Weeks does not understand this when she arranges for these things to take place, she doesn’t take into consideration what shifts I might be on & when I’ll be available to sort the loft out. I can’t get time off because you can hardly get time off for anything except if you die & then they’d expect you to ring in the following day to let them know whether you were still dead.

Apparently I’ve got 2 weeks to sort the loft out which means probably a maximum of 6 full days, 2 of which I’ll be sleeping because of a night shift, & 3 of which I’ve already made plans for months ago.

Then later in August she’s arranged for a man to come & build a new shed. Which is fine except he won’t be emptying the old shed, so I’ll have to do that too & I so wanted to go on holiday in August but now have to knock a few days off one end of it so I can sort the bloody shed out.

I think she’s got a list somewhere which will cover me until I’m about 73. I daren’t look at it.

No need for discussion on, just go & read it.