On Saturday 23rd August, Manchester witnessed the largest ever gathering of gay police officers during the annual ‘gay pride’ march in the city centre. Officers appeared in public wearing sweatshirts adorned with the slogan ‘Police with Pride’. Regrettably, this bizarre spectacle was just another depressing milestone in the humiliating decline of Greater Manchester police from a once proud force, into little more than a showcase for politically-correct exhibitionism.
The BNP firmly believes that the state should not concern itself with what consenting adults, ‘gay’ or ‘straight’, do in the privacy of their own homes. Equally, state institutions such as the police or prison services should not demean themselves by encouraging their officers to flaunt their private predilections in a public parade. A police officer might be homosexual, but surely he or she should be obliged to present a dignified and smart public persona? Police officers would never be allowed to participate in a ‘white pride’ parade, so why should they be officially encouraged to take part in ‘Gay Pride’?
Unfortunately for Greater Manchester Police (GMP), the ‘Police with Pride’ spectacle coincided with the release of a report showing that GMP missed 13 of its 17 targets between April and June 2008. Burglary, drugs offences and serious violent crime were among the categories where GMP’s results were deemed ‘unacceptable. Greater Manchester Police Authority has also expressed ’serious concerns’ about the force’s performance.
Of course, most ordinary GMP police officers continue to serve their community conscientiously and impartially, just as they have always done. Indeed their ranks have included a fair number of outright heroes, such as DC Stephen Oake, who fell in the line of duty while trying to arrest a Muslim terrorist and was justly awarded a posthumous George Cross. Nonetheless, these fine rank-and-file officers have been increasingly let down by a cadre of senior commanders whose dedication to advancing their politically-correct careers seems to exceed their dedication to upholding law and order.
These senior officers notoriously included the late Chief Constable Todd, whose unexplained death on Mount Snowdon — assumed to be suicide — generated national publicity. Todd was popular with his officers, but the sordid press revelations which accompanied his death cast doubt on his fitness to be a police officer at all, let alone Chief Constable of Britain’s second largest force.
Towards the end of Todd’s tenure as Chief Constable, Greater Manchester Police seemed to lose interest in ordinary policing, in favour of politically-motivated repression. The force adopted an increasingly anti-white stance, and pursued their policy of institutional discrimination against the BNP with an almost missionary zeal.
For example, in May 2007, with massive publicity, GMP launched a prolonged investigation into ludicrous allegations that off-duty police officers had been seen drinking with ‘BNP supporters’ outside a city centre pub on St George’s day. Predictably, the investigation failed to make any headway, but not before vast sums of taxpayers’ money had been wasted. (1)
Greater Manchester Police commanders seem to have a particular problem with Mancunians who dare to celebrate St George’s day. On St George’s day 2008, senior officers saw fit to authorise the baton-charging of exuberant St George’s day revellers in the city centre. The contrast with GMP’s kid glove treatment of overt criminality during Eid celebrations in the Rusholme district of the city has been widely noted.
Senator McCarthy himself would have been proud of Greater Manchester Police’s political witch-hunts. During the local election campaign of 2008, the Manchester Evening News ran a series of stories, seemingly sourced from Greater Manchester Police, describing GMP’s efforts to hound out officers suspected of harbouring political sympathy for the BNP. One officer who supposedly wore a union flag badge was ‘investigated’. Another officer who disclosed that he had purchased a copy of Voice of Freedom for research purposes was disciplined and transferred. The human right of free expression and free access to lawful newspapers obviously ceased to exist a long time ago in GMP! (2)
Most seriously of all, in the city of Manchester itself, Greater Manchester Police attempted to intervene directly in an election campaign. In the district of Blackley, where the BNP always commands more than a quarter of the vote, a senior police officer was quoted in a local newspaper warning about the BNP “latching onto” racism. This unprecedented intervention in party politics was made just three weeks before the local elections. (3)
BNP activists in Manchester suspect that the governing politburo of Greater Manchester Police might be very dismayed indeed if they grasped the true extent of BNP support among GMP officers in general, and sergeants and inspectors in particular. After all, it is these brave officers who deal day and night with the dreadful consequences of Manchester’s failed multicultural experiment, even as they are undermined and betrayed by their own senior commanders.
With Todd’s death, the people of Greater Manchester dared to hope for a return to traditional policing priorities, and a renewed commitment to upholding law and order. Sadly, it seems as if residents’ hopes have now been dashed. Todd’s replacement as the new Chief Constable of Greater Manchester is Peter Fahy, formerly Chief Constable of Cheshire and chair of the Association of Chief Police Officers’ so-called “Race & Diversity” unit.
Fahy’s main contribution to the national policing debate seems to be his call for overt discrimination against white police officers to be legalised. Fahy is reported to have said, “Clearly, if we are going to be held to account on particular targets based on representation, the only way we can meet that is through affirmative action … to take into account somebody’s ethnic background.” (4)
With all this in mind, it is no surprise that few Mancunians feel any sense of pride in their police, ‘gay’ or otherwise.