By Avril Ormsby
(Reuters) - Britain needs to tackle deep-seated social
problems following riots and looting in English cities this week, the
center-right government said on Saturday, and a U.S. street crime expert it has
brought in said arrests alone would not solve the problem.
"There are communities
that have just been left behind by the rest of the country. There are
communities that are cut-off from the economic life-blood of the rest of the
country," Finance Minister George Osborne said.
Prime Minister David Cameron, criticized
by some in his Conservative party as being too liberal on crime and punishment,
has taken a hard line on rioting in statements this week after returning from
his summer holiday and recalling parliament.
He has also come under attack
for austerity measures his government is introducing to tackle a huge debt
burden.
Osborne said throwing money at
the issue was not the answer and the government would press on with deep cuts
to the numbers of police, who have been criticized by Cameron for their
handling of the riots.
The Conservative mayor of
London, Boris Johnson, has said the riots, which broke out a week ago after a
demonstration against the police shooting of a suspect, weakened the case for
those cuts.
Cameron has said political and
economic grievances had little to do with days of looting and violence which
followed in which five people were killed, calling it "criminality pure
and simple" and saying gang violence lay at its heart.
He enlisted U.S. street crime
expert William Bratton on Friday to advise the government on handling it.
Bratton, credited with curbing
street crime as police chief in New York, Los Angeles and Boston, said he would
offer advice based on his experience tackling gangs.
"You can't arrest your
way out of the problem," he told U.S. broadcaster ABC on Saturday.
"Arrest is certainly appropriate for the most violent, the incorrigible,
but so much of it can be addressed in other ways and it's not just a police
issue, it is in fact a societal issue."
Cities were largely quiet on
Friday and Saturday. British police flooded the streets again to ensure weekend
drinking does not reignite the rioting that shocked Britons and sullied the
country's image a year before it hosts the Olympic Games.
More than 1,200 people have
been arrested in connection with violence disorder and looting and hundreds
have been charged. Police have set up screens in city centers showing pictures
of suspects and plan to display them at soccer matches on Saturday.
THANKS
Tariq Jahan, whose
21-year-old son was one of three men who died in an apparent hit-and-run
incident in Birmingham on Wednesday, told reporters he was "humbled"
by the letters of support from people around the world.
"I also want to thank
the young people in Birmingham for listening to what I had to say and staying
calm," he said.
Osborne said lessons needed
to be learned. "There are very deep-seated social problems which we need
to tackle," he said in the interview with BBC radio.
"This about a far bigger
challenge for our society which is dealing with people who we have ignored for
too long and helping them feel they have a stake in society, feel that they
know the difference between right and wrong, understand their responsibilities
to other communities, not just their rights."
About 200 people took part in
a demonstration on Saturday in north London calling for more support for
youngsters living in grim and violent housing estates, a Reuters reporter said.
A ComRes poll for The
Independent newspaper showed 54 percent of Britons say Cameron failed to
provide leadership early enough to control the riots.
Most offenders are unemployed
young men, though they have included a millionaire's daughter, a charity
worker, a journalism student and a soldier.
The scale and ferocity of the
rioting, not only in inner-city areas but also in some middle-class suburbs,
has generated a debate with starkly different views, with many people saying
the police should have been tougher.
The former leader of one of
London's most feared street gangs said the riots were not the brainchild of
gang leaders but, in many cases, the result of a build-up of frustration among
young people growing up on grim housing estates with little hope.
"The fire's there,
secured in a room, locked away and then someone's opened the door and it's
spread through the house," Elijah Kerr, who transformed his gang into an
organization helping young people, told Reuters in an interview.
(Additional reporting by Keith Weir and Stefano Abrogi in London and Ray
Sanchez and Daniel Trotta in New York; Writing by Philippa
Fletcher; Editing by Louise
Ireland)
Source : Reuters
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