Splintered Sunrise

Considering that the number one issue of public concern in West Belfast is crime and anti-social behaviour, this is a good time to be reading the Andersonstown News. Round about this time of year, the Andytown News normally runs a “Don’t let the hoods out” campaign, due to the Brits emptying the Young Offenders’ Centre. Following that, the released hoods go buck mad for two weeks, and in January the Andytown News’ unmissable texts page is full of punters giving off about their Christmas being ruined by the seasonal crime wave.

Unfortunately, last Monday’s Andytown News doesn’t have that, but it does have plenty on crime and anti-social behaviour. On page 3 we read of the ongoing saga of Jin Zheng, owner of a Chinese takeaway on the Suffolk Road, who is thinking about leaving the area after suffering nearly two solid years of harassment and racist abuse. This culminated on Friday 30th with bricks being thrown at the premises. Mr Zheng says that, due to the large gangs of drunken hoods who congregate outside the takeaway, both customers and staff are afraid to come in. And this is in our brave new multicultural Belfast.

But there’s more. Turn over to page 4 and you will learn of thieves nicking lead from the roof of a care home in Poleglass. On page 5 the city council is yet again trying to get off-licences to sign up to a code to tackle underage drinking, which must be at least the fifth or sixth such initiative I can think of off the top of my head. On page 8 you can read about arsonists burning out phone boxes on the Glen Road, which used to be a nice area that got through the Troubles more or less unscathed.

And that tells you something about what concerns people in West Belfast these days. So I was tickled to turn to the letters page and read a contribution on “Youngsters and crime” from People Before Profit, which is the Socialist Workers Party in a funny hat. The comrades tell us:

Areas containing high levels of poverty naturally have high crime levels. Poverty affects your level of health, education and the prospect of a decent job. Those living in deprived areas turn to crime because it seems to be the only solution to their poverty.

I don’t buy that for a second. Twenty years ago, when the area had much worse poverty than it does now, crime was a fraction of what it is today. Of course, then you had the Troubles, and as an offshoot of that a highly effective regime of vigilantism. The hoods these days aren’t scared any more, and moreover they are strikingly affluent.

We also have a reference to the recent Save Our Barracks campaign, and what seems to be an attempt to appeal to the Provo audience by slagging Margaret Ritchie:

All over Belfast recently the Department for Social Development has been trying to sell off public land to private developers. Surely the children in Belfast would benefit from government initiatives designed to build facilities of leisure etc on pieces of publicly owned land. The handing over of public land, services or facilities to the private sector does nothing to address the issue of poverty and exclusion, it exacerbates it.

I don’t buy this either. Not that I’m a friend of property developers or an advocate of privatisation, but it seems to have the whole issue arse about face. Belfast is coming down with leisure facilities. There are no less than three council-run leisure centres in West Belfast alone, not to mention all the private gyms and the salons where the proletariat go for their spray tans and Brazilian waxes. And these private facilities have mushroomed precisely during recent years when the area has been hit by this crime wave.

It’s also worth recalling the reason why the Brits built the big centres, as part of a “bread and leisure centres” policy in the 1970s. The theory was that if you gave young people something to do then they wouldn’t riot. What happened was that the young people availed of the new facilities to pump iron, and then they rioted. This is why I’m not convinced that you can reduced crime by putting up a corrugated iron hut for kids to play pool in.

Our correspondent also says that “putting people into jail or demanding tougher sentences for trivial ‘crimes’ such as not paying TV licences or for young people drinking on the streets creates problems.” Well, not paying TV licences may appeal to the scally end of the working class, but I must advise the comrades that there aren’t many votes in saying that street drinking is a trivial matter. And this is actually one of the major reasons for the rise in anti-social behaviour, in the shape of ridiculously cheap booze available 24/7. Look at the groups of street drinkers hanging about the place – these aren’t generally schoolkids. These are lads of drinking age, who could and should be in the pub. But why should they go to the pub and pay nearly three quid for a pint when you can buy lager at 26p a can in the supermarket? And, because the law against street drinking isn’t enforced, they can hang around street corners in large groups and harass the public, instead of drinking at home where they wouldn’t bother anybody.

Before I get an irate response from the local SWP, I should say that there are also good points in the letter about things like underinvestment in public services. But the whole thing is dreadfully confused. And I would also point out that, if you’re in the business of seeking votes in West Belfast, this sort of liberal flapdoodle won’t get you very far. Most of the working class, and old age pensioners are especially strident on the point, are all in favour of cracking down big time on the hoods who make their lives a misery.

So we turn to the texts page in the same issue and find the following trenchant comment:

There should be a group that kneecaps scumbags, which would be drug dealers, joyriders, rapists and burglars. I heard a woman in her 70s say it at a bus stop and I agree, she is right. The PSNI do nothing.

There’s your authentic voice of the working class. Put yourself about a bit and you’ll hear the same thing every day. And while you may baulk at putting it in your manifesto, these are the concerns you’ll have to deal with.