ZERO TOLERANCE

The principal behind Zero Tolerance is that any crime or misdemeanour no matter how small, must be pursued, prosecuted and the offender punished. The theory being that such actions will encourage people to desist from criminal activity and the public will see that those who do not are punished for their anti-social actions. No longer will the police have the power to simply reprimand or caution as in the past with the words, "Excuse me sir, that cigarette packet you threw on the floor; that is a crime called littering. I suggest you pick it up now and we'll say no more on the matter"; no they will have to prosecute for littering.

Which means that the courts will soon be full of trivial cases where nothing is gained by such pointless prosecutions. Police having powers to impose on the spot fines rather than requiring a full court prosecution, in no time at all leads to a police state.

As the law stands now, it is a criminal offence not to inform the police of a crime that you have knowledge of. Which means that every time a driver breaks the speed limit, even by one mile per hour, they should turn themselves in at the nearest police station. Imagine turning up at the local station every night, joining the mile long queue, and admitting that, "I did 31mph on the High Street today". It wouldn't be long before the desk sergeant was screaming, "F--k off !", as soon as you entered the station.

Which just goes to show that Zero Tolerance is a complete joke and is impractical to implement or carry through to completion. Another irony is, in the case of cars, that the speedometer needs to only be 10% accurate at 30mph in order to pass an MOT, so even the most law abiding citizen in the land may be tootling down the road believing that they are well below the speed limit only to find themselves hauled up in court for breaking it. Or are we going to allow some leeway in these circumstances? In which case, what is the point of Zero Tolerance?