POLICE UNPREPARED FOR RIOTS BECAUSE OF MORE TAXES AND SPENDING CUTS, TORIES CLAIM

POLICE forces are unprepared to deal with riots this summer because the government has “taxed police off our streets”, according to Shadow Policing Minister Matt Vickers.

Speaking to GB News, he said: “I think one of the reasons they won’t be prepared is because under the last government we got to record numbers of police on our streets. The big news yesterday was the police workforce numbers came out, and the number of police on our streets has gone down. It fell by 1,316.

“We said this would happen when the budget came out, and when our police forces got slammed with that National Insurance increase, they’re literally taxing the police off our streets, and it will have real consequences in all sorts of situations, particularly in what might come this summer, if what they’re saying does happen.”

Defending the previous government’s record, he said: “We put 20,000 more police on the streets. That is literally the highest number ever. And we don’t want to be going backwards on police. We want to be going forwards. We should be adding more police.

“But this government, we told them what would happen, and it’s already down, 1,316 less police on the streets in communities like mine and yours. That has real consequences, particularly what they’re saying might happen this summer.”

On the anti-migrant protest in Epping, he said: “There’s two sides to this story. One is you’ve got individuals turned up from here, there and everywhere, with extreme views, who are just coming to cause trouble, and they have to be treated very differently from real people who are concerned about what’s going on in their community, who have the right to protest.

“You’ve got to separate the two out very clearly. There’s got to be real consequences and sanctions for people who bring about violence in those communities. But the reality is that the people who lose out, the cost of this violence, of people who turn up and have a, you know, punch up in the street and create all sorts of chaos, the consequences are felt by those communities.

“Because not only are they dealing with whatever’s gone on by way of these hotels and trying to protest about it, it’s the elderly people who don’t go out at night because they know this stuff’s happening in their community in a way it never has, is the businesses that have to shut their doors early, take the financial hit. Be afraid to open and do business, and people can’t go to work.

“There are real consequences to that sort of violence on our streets. We don’t want to see it, but at the same time, people should have the right to protest over what is a terrible situation. Some of the incidents they’re suggested to have happened with some of these migrants are appalling.”

He added: “When you look at what happened, at one point hotels were being closed. Keir Starmer got elected, and we are opening more hotels. The number of people arriving in the country hasn’t gone up a little bit. It’s gone up nearly 50%.

“44,000 people have arrived in the country since he was elected. The thing was very bad, was unacceptably bad, and now it’s on steroids. He’s rolled out the red carpet. He said to people he has changed the law in the House of Commons to say that if you arrive in this country illegally, you can become a British citizen. That’s appalling. That’s atrocious.

“We had the fight go on to try and put the Rwanda scheme in place. The reality is, if you arrive in a country illegally, if you break into this country, you have committed a crime, you should be detained and you should be removed. And until we start doing that, more and more people will continue to arrive.

“The easier it makes it to get British citizenship, the more people are likely to arrive. There’s got to be real consequences. We’ve got to deter people from coming.

“We’ve got to – we talked about removing benefits for foreigners, and actually my party put forward amendments in there to the Labour Party’s nationality and borders bill that would have said we would deport you if you commit a crime in this country, any crime.

“At the moment, you’ve got to get a sentence at least 12 months. We said, no, if you come to this country, you commit a crime, you are going, including if you arrive in the country illegally.”