When one has to write an editorial five days a week it can be very hard to find a subject that’s “hot”. Then there’s days when there is so much you don’t know which one to choose. Today is like that. However, the one I have chosen today really makes “my blood boil.” We have the proposed changes to the criminal and penal codes that generally most people will agree with, as it will give the police more powers to deal with gangs. Sneaked into these proposals is one concerning public disorder issues that include tramps and drunks.

Whoever came up this piece of legislation would not look out of place as a member of The Party in George Orwell’s “1984”. He has obviously been trained in the American House of Representatives how to tack on unrelated legislation to a popular Bill to be debated there. Tramps and drunks can be fined $1,000 and 12 months in prison. This is up from $30 and 30 days in jail. Unlawful assembly, which gives the police powers to disperse public gatherings of any kind if a senior officer suspects anyone in the group to have harassed someone else. The penalty for this is up from 2 years to four. If you refuse to accompany a policeman exercising the power of search your fine goes up from $100 to a whopping $2,000!

These additional powers were added on to the bill targeting the gang problems and, I strongly suspect, in the hope no one would realise how draconian and un-needed this legislation was. When has tramps and drunks roaming our streets at night been a problem? How many riots have we had recently or anytime requiring police to disperse public gatherings? Do we want this country to become a police state?

What we want is improved police efficiency that has been lacking even long before the 1996 Community and Safety Report we highlighted this week. We want that addressed and put right NOW. We want to know why evidence disappears? We want to know where the missing guns from the police arsenal are? What we don’t want is more bureaucracy and we don’t want our personal freedoms taken away from a police force that is increasingly becoming less transparent with seemingly no accountability.

This newspaper has been on the police side. We have tried and tried to put, where we can, a positive slant to our stories involving the police. We have praised them highly when it has been deserved. We have urged and urged the public to help the police and work with them as a team. How many times have I personally begged family and friends of gang members to come forward and give information to the police? We, as a society, want the police to succeed. The publisher of this newspaper, Joan (Watler) Wilson is the daughter of a deceased Cayman Island Chief of Police.

Sadly, at this time, the public perception of the RCIPS is at an all time low. Is it deserved? Well, we don’t want additional public liberty taken away laws that are absolutely not needed, and tacked on to a Bill nearly everyone will support. It is sneaky. It makes me see “red” and will do the opposite of improving relations with the police. More powers to “senior officers”. I have to agree with local attorney, Peter Polack, when he described recent police changes “as expensive high tech law enforcement window dressing” that will not produce results.

I urge our legislators to take a close look at these additional powers and have then removed from the Bill. Isn’t it incredible, when we want something passed giving the police more powers to deal with gang membership with increased penalties for it and gang related crimes, they have to mess and muddle that up; with sneaky additional legislation unconnected with the real issues affecting us?

If it is passed, look out for all those pirates having a “good time” during Pirates Week locked up for a year along with our tourists. No, that’s not true. It will be a rapist. That’s all the time he seems to spend in jail and he even gets his own spot to become a star on a Government TV show.

As Ebenezer Scrooge said, “Bah humbug!”