Report to the People
21st June 2004
Common Sense Wins the Day
In
among the hectic round of meetings, correspondence and discussions about the
flawed plans for Inverclyde Royal Hospital, last week also saw an important
piece of work come to an end.
After
over a year in the legislative machinery, the Antisocial Behaviour Bill has
finally cleared its last parliamentary hurdle.
It
has certainly been a long and involved process. It was last spring when First Minister, Jack McConnell, came
to Greenock to hear our experiences and our demands for action – points we
underlined to the Communities Minister, Margaret Curran, when she visited the Mearns
Centre to discuss what was, at the time, a planned Bill.
Not
only was the Minister impressed by our community’s contribution to the debate,
she also commended the Telegraph’s campaign
to expose the drug dealers and others who were making decent people’s lives a
misery – a point she repeated to MSPs on Thursday.
The
Minister’s visit, together with a survey of local opinion, formed our formal
submission to the consultation on the Bill. The figures in the submission spoke for themselves.
The vast majority of my constituents wanted those who damaged their
communities to be forced to make amends. They
also said the police should have more powers to tackle unruly groups of
youngsters and were clear that parents should take more responsibility for their
own children.
Measures
to answer every one of these calls were put in the Bill.
And, despite the best efforts of fringe party MSPs; politically correct
commentators; and some professionals who, to be frank, completely failed to deal
with the problem in the first place, they stayed in.
We
now have legislation in place which puts the victims first and will make our
streets, our homes and our communities safer.
What
characterised this debate, however, was how the people on the ground with
firsthand experience of the problem were poles apart from the professionals and
lobbyists. Although, almost
universally, we called for these powers, the establishment told us, from the
safety of their leafy avenues, not to be so silly.
That
we eventually won the day in the face of this opposition is cause for
celebration and something from which all those involved can perhaps learn.
I am sure that those agencies whose muscles we have strengthened will now
recognise the law of the land and use their new, hard-won powers to enforce it
and deliver a real boost to our quality of life.
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