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£200,000 to help fund 'workshops' for violent gang members



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Published Date: 15 February 2008
By craig brown
TEENAGERS are to be given lessons on the impact of alcohol and weapon-carrying in a bid to tackle Scotland's violent gang culture.
A £200,000 package was yesterday announced by Kenny MacAskill, the justice secretary, to establish anti-gang workshops, which will run alongside football matches and youth clubs.

The announcement came after a report last week revealed Glasgow ha
s 170 teenage gangs – the same number as in London despite a population one-sixth the size.

The cash will be spent on local schemes that offer activities to divert youngsters from crime, such as sports.

Specialist training – including a "toolkit" with more than 40 examples of intervention workshops and programmes – is also being given to police and officials working with gangs.

Detective Chief Inspector Andy McKay, Safer Scotland Co-ordinator, said the schemes would involve targeting small groups of known gang members at a time.

He explained: "They will involve targeting five, ten individuals who are in a gang, bringing them into a room and having a workshop with them.

"It will make them face up to what issues they are causing the community, what positive things they can do, and really make them face up to the negatives and impact that they will have on others.

"I'm convinced it will make a huge difference. We've already been doing a lot of diversion work with gangs, but you do that for three or four weeks, then they're back on the streets and you haven't done anything to change their outlook on life, how they view their purpose of being in a gang. We have to make them face up to this."

During a visit to an area of Ibrox, Glasgow, which has experienced gang violence, Mr MacAskill said: "We've got to show these kids that there are other things to do in life than drinking and getting involved in fighting.

"Most of these kids can be turned around; those have to be punished will be punished. We can't go on as we are."

Divisional police offices will be able to bid for a share of the cash to fund events such as hiring sports halls or other community facilities. Bill Aitken, Tory justice spokesman and MSP for Glasgow, supported the move.

He said: "We must give youngsters every opportunity by creating much greater recreational and educational facilities for them.

"At the same time, those who continue to carry knives, commit crime and breach the peace have to expect they will be dealt with appropriately."





The full article contains 425 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
Page 1 of 1

 
1

Neanderthal75,

Rocky Mountains USA 15/02/2008 00:57:02
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink!

Go ahead and waste the 200,000 pounds on individuals who've chosen to be criminals: if you get a 1% positive return rate, it'll be truly amazing.

Then, AFTER you've wasted the 200,000 pounds, THEN redefine the phrase '..dealt with appropriately.' to mean what it used to mean: a severe beating before they reach the jail, a severe beating once in jail, and after being sentenced from 1 year to life (depending on the crime) WITHOUT parole, beat them severely yet again, at least once a month as a reminder of WHY the young scum really do NOT want to EVER be committing crimes again!!

Being nice to people that are out to take merciless advantage of others, only gets you more merciless scum, out looking to do uglies to innocent people.

The only way the majority of them are going to learn is through great and repeated pain: just like they impose upon their innocent victims.

The difference is that the lowlife scum will DESERVE the pain they receive.

Yeah I know, you liberal/politically correct twits will whine, scream, and lament the 'horror' of such suggestions as I've written above; but then again, YOU'RE not the one having been mugged, robbed, beaten, raped, knifed, or murdered, nor a close family member of someone who has.

Get some 'up close and personal' time with the lowlife scum you support and whine about, THEN we'll talk.

Cheers from the Rockies
2

ex-labour,

15/02/2008 01:11:37
1# Learn to read Neanderthal, and if you have comment to make, perhaps you could address the latest school shooting in your own country.

The headline here is very misleading and obviously meant to cloud the issue. The proposalis are not to fund violent criminals, but to divert youngsters from this route. However, it can only work if they have something to offer the kids, other than the same old environment and nothing to occupy them.
3

John Blackley,

Winter Garden, FL 15/02/2008 02:15:27
Glad to see the effort being made - and, at two hundred thousand quid, it's comparatively inexpensive (compared to the cost of, say, banging them up for ten years apiece.)

Part of the reason (no, I don't know how big a part) that kids join gangs is they don't get what they need from their parents (discipline, nurture, etc.) Too many join gangs, have children and then those children - lacking effective parents - turn to gangs also.

If this effort starts to break that cycle - shows gang members that a gang life is destructive and self-destructive then maybe - just maybe - that cycle can be broken for some.

I'll keep my fingers crossed.
4

Encephalon,

15/02/2008 02:26:55
Judging by the scale of the problem 200 million pounds would not be enough never mind 200,000-however if it does make a difference to a few young lives it will be money well spent.

Also the police need to be more pro-active in being visible on the beat and targeting knife carriers 365 days a year rather than their annual publicly announced crackdowns.

That and birching a few of the scum would be a welcome start.
5

Royster,

15/02/2008 05:16:16
For a tenner you can get one of those rattan sticks they use in Singapore.
6

Neanderthal75,

Rocky Mountains USA 15/02/2008 05:36:27
Hello Ex-Labour,

My dear fellow, soon you'll see a change in the laws in many states, which will allow students who are duly licensed, to Carry on campus.

The result?

The next time some idiot steps out with a shotgun, several students will pull their revolvers and automatics and turn him into swiss cheese! The only life lost in the whole incident, will be the would be murderer's!!!

Lastly, allow me to point out that you Scots and certainly the English, have MANY more knifings and deaths from knifings, than do we here in the USA!!!!

It doesn't matter one wit whether you're dead from lead or steel, you're just as dead! I don't see you calling for kitchen knives to be taken out of kitchens across Scotland, now do I? Why is that my dear Ex?

I need to also remind you that when people like you called for the complete abolition of the right of individuals to own handguns in Great Britain, you and the rest of your ilk promised that there'd be an end to unnecessary deaths from handguns and that criminals wouldn't be able to get them anymore.

The Gun Owners' Lobby said again and again, that if handguns were abolished, only criminals and cops would have them, and that gun crime would NOT go down.

The result of the gun ban?

People are still dying from the illegal handguns.
Criminals can STILL get all the guns they want.
Crime has NOT went down, it has went UP.

Which means my dear Ex, that YOU and your side were wrong and that the Gun Owners' Lobby and Gun Owners, were RIGHT!

But you don't mind that, the guns are gone, the criminals are still free to use them, and you feel smugly righteous at having deprived someone else of their rights.

Just like any Arrogant Elitist would feel.

Cheers from the Rockies
7

beeree,

15/02/2008 07:05:17
Pity McAskilll was not so keen to act when Blackshirt thugs swaggered through Glasgow streets 3 weeks ago.

Begs the question that if Glasgow is prepared to tolerate racist/fascist intimidation in the name of "free speech" should they be allowed to host the Commonwealth Games.
8

eric,

Lothian 15/02/2008 07:58:28
Sour grapes in here!
9

hertscot,

15/02/2008 08:45:21
#^ Neanderthal75,

In your country, people die because of legal weapons!
10

boudica,

Glasgow 15/02/2008 17:25:37
Instead of wasting £200.000 on soft options for these Violent Criminals ...why not send them to the Army for a couple of years and send them to Iraq or face the Taliban that will sort them out faster than any soft option ...these Looney Leftist Liberal Idea`s are what labour were kicked out for and so will the SNP..
11

Neanderthal75,

Rocky Mountains USA 15/02/2008 18:01:06
Hello Hertscot,

Yes they do; but nearly TWICE as many die from Booze related auto accidents.

I don't see the anti-gun lobby calling for the abolition of the whiskey made in Scotland-which IS according to your anti-gun logic, KILLING 25,000 to 30,000 men, women, and children each and every year in the USA.

I doubt I'll see YOU calling for the abolition of booze in Scotland either; your either like to drink, work as part of the industry, or like the jobs they provide to Scots, and the tax revenues from the booze!

Ah, but you folks of the anti-gun lobby get real quiet when it comes to people losing their lives due to booze, don't you?

I'd also like to point out, that if you would bother to go to the FBI site (Dept. of Justice) and look at the actual, factual, numbers, you'd see that deaths from handguns is beggared by that from booze.

You'd also see that LEGAL use of guns to save lives, is 100 times GREATER than the number of deaths each year, due to illegal guns.

Then again, were you or any other anti-gunner actually interested in facts, rather than emotive subjectivity and a desire to fulfill a self-righteous streak a mile long, you'd see that there are some 200 MILLION guns owned by some 100 Million Americans.

At the end of the day, 7,000 to 10,000 Americans die from illegal handgun usage.

Do the math will you? A fifth of booze is more likely to kill and American, than is a handgun.

But neither you nor your friends want to stop stores from selling booze.

A wonder that, isn't it?

Cheers from the Rockies
12

weeshooie1,

Wollongong 15/02/2008 21:17:10
Workshop AND Toolkit? Scotlands gangs are already tooled up. Anyhow, whits aw' this rubbish about gangs in Ibrox, eh? Ah've never heard the like o' that :o)

 

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