Further Evidence Of A Screwed Up Society!

CCTV cameras equipped with loudspeakers are to give a public telling-off to people behaving badly in crime hotspots across 20 English towns and cities.

Children's voices are to be used initially to make the encounter less confrontational. In Middlesbrough they have been used to deal with littering, drunken and disorderly behaviour and vandalism, and even to disperse intimidating groups loitering in shopping areas and on housing estates.

CCTV footage released yesterday showed a reveller on a street in Middlesbrough being watched after picking up a traffic cone and hitting a public phone box with it. A voice boomed out from the speaker attached to the camera: "Warning you in the dark T-shirt, you are being monitored by CCTV. Please put the traffic cone back where you found it, thank you." The man put down the cone and went on his way.

Oh My God!

Who came up with this one I wonder? Not only is it ludicrous to think that anyone who is intent on causing a disturbance will actually listen to these "voices of God" but what idiot came up with the idea of using a child's voice?

Can you imagine being told by a pre-pubescent voice to refrain from whatever activity you have been caught doing? It's ludicrous, ridiculous and naive to think that this is going to work!

Instead of making resources available for this ineffectual use of technology, surely it would be better spent on education and providing facilities for the young 'uns to use to keep them off the streets in the first place?

What's going to be next I wonder? Remote control tasers? Tranquiliser darts operated remotely? I dread to think!

It astounds me that people who have the authority to endorse and promote these initiatives are so far away from reality that they think these things are actually going to make a significant difference.

I look forward to the next initiative to promote social change with baited breath!