Just after Edinburgh Council’s budget was passed in February, the local Green Party posted a quite imbecilic message on social media.
Claiming to promote their plans for the Tourist Tax, it featured Sighthill councillor Dan Heap with the ridiculous “Defund the Police” slogan, which it turns out was just a warm-up for the sheer lunacy of their Scottish Parliament candidate Kate Nevens’ call for prisons to be closed.
With no hint of irony, Cllr Heap’s demand was part of their plan for “protecting services” and “creating safer community environments”, and it simply beggars belief that these people think they could run a tombola never mind a country.
But with people like this representing communities, is it any wonder there is both a rise in lawlessness which is creating a crisis for shopkeepers repeatedly targeted by thieves.
Latest figures showed reported shoplifting rose 24 per cent, with an average of 27 incidents a day between April and September last year, just short of 5000 incidents, and the situation has become so acute that Police Scotland has invested £3 million in a specialist Retail Crime Taskforce.
It’s not a victimless crime because it can put small shops out of business, depriving communities of a service, or bigger stores are forced to pass on the cost to customers because they operate on small profit margins anyway.
Defunding police, closing prisons and encouraging civil disobedience is a recipe for anarchy and the Green Party is not so much a party of environmental protection but of social destruction.
