Station crackdown

Elephant & Castle rail station in summer crackdown
'More than 70 officers took part'
'six-week operation'
'21 arrests'
'most of the arrests were drug related'
Is the Transport Police simply using the arrests of personal-use-druggies to 'pad out' the headline arrest figures and thus justify their over-time and the cost of their new toys?

The 70 officers were across South London stations, not just E&C. 21 arrests at E&C, 223 altogether.

However, I take your point.

Never sure if little and often or intensive and full throttle is a beter policy in these things. Does a concentrated all-out attack succeed where a drip drip day by day effort may fail? Dunno.

What a complete waste of time - the police use such activities as it's a guarantee of 100% clear-up rates - i.e. you find the crime (drug possesion) and solve it (person charged with drug possesion) at the same time. It's the kind of operation they love as it's great for the stats. As if people carrying small amounts of drugs for their own use does any harm to the majority of Londoners.

They also found lots of weapons.

Speaking as a daily commuter on that railway I am more than happy for them to do this. On the trains they only ever seem to put PCSOs. One time I pointed out to two of them on a train that a man in the next carriage had a knuckleduster on his hand, they looked white as a sheet as they walked reluctantly along to the next carriage to investigate!

i used the Elephant rail station a few weeks ago when they had a fare evasion crackdown and the amount of people travelling without tickets was astonishing-there was a big police presence then but seeing the agressiveness that the station staff were met with they were very much needed

JGarcia wrote:

As if people carrying small amounts of drugs for their own use does any harm to the majority of Londoners.

Except that drugs users need drug suppliers and tend to result in a speard of drug use. No-one will test to see if they are using drugs in a harmless manner before they sell them the drugs. Some people will also end up committing other crimes to further their drug use. You may feel that a recreational drug user is doing no harm, but somewhere down the line it is bad for society.

The real question is whether the prohibition of drugs worsens these problems or attentuates them.

Drugs should be available free of charge on the NHS to registered users (in sterile surroundings in shooting galleries). That would stop the homeless from mugging old ladies to get their next fix. It would put the dealers out of business, and it would make it very difficult for the dealers to get new people addicted.

It would also mean that addicts could be guaranteed high-quality consistent-strength drugs, with the benefits for their health. They would be taking their drugs in a controlled, medical environment.

I'm sure I've posted this before...

agree with Mapmaker..

where is the incentive to stop taking the drugs?

you also need lots of rehab and help to get users off the drugs keep giving them good quality drugs may spare society the muggings etc but it does not provide solutions for the users.