NOBODY likes a snitch. Even teachers speak disparagingly among themselves about persistent tell-tales because, if nothing else, it reveals a sneaky disposition.
This week, in five city secondary schools, police are launching the DAVE initiative. It sounds like a friendly wee programme yet it is anything but.
The idea is that kids are expected to report their classmates by "anonymous" text. If they key in
the word "reward", and their information leads to a conviction for vandalism or graffiti, they will indeed be rewarded.
Like everyone else I detest vandalism. I'm not crazy about graffiti either, unless it's the really arty stuff. But this is a lazy, divisive and nasty ploy that is so adult in its make-up and conception that it will cause mayhem among 11 to 18-year-olds.
If it was confined to reporting bullying or violence in school, or providing information in order to solve specific cases such as rape, murder or burglary, and extended to everyone – not just school children – I could see the point. We already have Crimestoppers for that.
But as it stands, the plan is vile.
I wouldn't have wanted my son when he was at school to be encouraged to make cowardly, anonymous tip-offs. There have always been good and bad boys and girls in classes. The good ones get on with their own business, stay out of trouble and look the other way. The bad ones risk discovery and getting their comeuppance. Setting one against the other is madness. Kids talk. Suppose the reporter's identity is exposed. Where will the police be when the tearful child finds him or herself sent to Coventry for being a tell-tale, called names in the playground and last to be picked for the rounders team – or worse?
What's to stop the bully hijacking the system and reporting innocent teenagers anonymously, or squabbling kids taking revenge on each other?
We know the dangers of adult false reporting and we know there are such things as unsafe convictions. Both ruin lives. Ask Sean Hodgson, banged up for 27 years for a crime he didn't commit. But do young teenagers fully appreciate the consequences of having one of their classmates taken in for police questioning?
And, depending on the severity of the vandalism or graffiti, are they aware of the devastating effects of a criminal conviction and court appearance on another youngster and his or her future? We've all seen kids doing things they shouldn't . . . drinking in public parks, brawling in the street, smoking joints. We take a balanced judgement that, in most cases, it's part of the troublesome teenage years and we, usually, refrain from calling the cops.
Destroying a school, breaking into a church or plundering slates off roofs are all serious crimes that need to be investigated and the perpetrators brought to justice. But though I hate the fact that the street furniture around our way is daubed with "tags" in indelible ink, I wouldn't want to see a child convicted for something that, all around Europe and beyond, has come to be pretty much a normal if unpleasant phase in the development of otherwise ordinary kids.
It's one thing having the police question teenagers in order to get information to solve a particular case of wanton vandalism. It's quite another to suggest Tom or Dick should voluntarily, and for reward, grass up Harry for drawing a face on the bicycle shed.
The headteacher of one of the schools involved, describes it as "a great initiative". I find it abhorrent, creepy and socially destructive.
Proud to be BritishSRI Lankan-born Deva Kumarasiri is proud to be a British citizen. He loves the country and his life here so much that he has made a rule in his Nottingham post office.
If any of the customers in his ethnically-diverse area can't be bothered to learn English and speak it in his shop, he simply refuses to serve them until they do . . . even if "Good morning, my Giro please," and "Thank-you" is as far as they get.
Regardless of whether you agree with him or not, can you imagine the outcry if he'd been white, native-born, Anglo-Saxon John Brown?
Get priorities rightLITTER wardens in Edinburgh last year issued only one spot fine each per month. Surely this is good news to add to Edinburgh's 2008 Keep Scotland Beautiful award for cleanliness?
That's what we want. Less litter and fewer fines. Some councillors (Labour and Tory, of course) are complaining that the wardens have brought in only three per cent of the £600,000 it costs to employ them. Which gives you an insight into their priorities. So here, for the moaning ex-administration, is the message so they can understand. It's not about revenue.
