He escaped the
death penalty, but
was robbed of his life
The positive
power of
the death knock
In my favourite place,
we were locked in
by 6.30pm
The Cafe 2
The very public apology yesterday by the deputy chief constable for Lothian and Borders clearly stated that the police did not record and investigate the murderous assault on Simon San in Edinburgh in 2010 as a racist incident.
The internal police investigation has concluded, and we are now advised lessons have been learned, new guidance issued and disciplinary action taken; no doubt a line is being drawn under what has been an embarrassing case for the police. The smoothly presented results of the internal investigation by the police PR machine seems to have been well planned and prepared. No need yet for a ministerial summit on racism or a new set of national rules. That’s all right then.
However, the inadequate investigation of the circumstances of Simon San’s death and the subsequent prosecution raises a number of important questions, many of which still remain unanswered even after the police apology. It is therefore surprising that the Crown Office has issued only a short statement indicating the lord advocate is satisfied with the Crown’s prosecution of the case and will not be instructing an enquiry. Am I alone in finding this statement puzzling?
I am not a lawyer (or a criminal or a judge for that matter) but with my limited knowledge of Scots law I understand that the Crown Office through the Procurator Fiscal service also has an investigative role complementary to that of the police in that they provide instructions and directions to police investigations and also interview witnesses and gather and review evidence separately from the police as part of the decision to prosecute. In my view the decision to prosecute and the PF report to crown counsel are parts of the prosecution process.
If the police have undertaken an internal investigation why is the Crown Office not undertaking a similar review of their investigative role in this case? Are they the professional service they think they are and have they been sufficiently thorough, critical and accurate in their handling of this case in the face of the police failings? The brief Crown Office statement provides me with no assurance that a high standard has been achieved in the prosecution of this case and little evidence of the needs of the public and importantly the needs of the victim’s family being properly met.
The wheels of justice usually grind slowly but in Scotland they grind quickly, particularly when it comes to Crown Office performance against key targets. Unfortunately the Crown Office only seems to have targets related to clearance times, nothing on measures of quality and certainly no timescales for website press releases on the degree of satisfaction of the lord advocate.
John Brown
Unlike many publications SR doesn’t have an online comment facility – we prefer a more considered approach. The Cafe is our readers’ forum. If you would like to contribute to it, please email islay@scottishreview.net
Iona
Photograph by Islay McLeod
The absence of belief
is part of the reason for
our current malaise
Walter Humes
Reflecting on the significance of the recent riots, my ageing mind made an unexpected connection. It did occur to me that the neural pathways in my brain might simply have got themselves into a tangle, marking the beginning of accelerated mental decline, but this disturbing thought was not something I was prepared to dwell on. Into my head had popped an image of a colleague from some years ago. He was an extremely able man – highly intelligent, managerially competent and politically astute. For my taste, he was a little lacking in the humour department, but that is not a hanging offence.
Talented though he was, however, I always felt that there was something missing. At first I could not put my finger on it, but eventually came to the conclusion that the problem was he simply didn’t believe in anything very much. There were no professional values or cherished principles that really mattered to him and none that he would have been prepared to go to the wall to defend. Ask him to write a planning document, preferably one requiring statistics, graphs and financial projections, and he would do a superb job. But invite him to engage in philosophical discussion about the fundamental beliefs which should inform our work and he had little or nothing to contribute.
How, you might well wonder, does this relate to recent events? I would suggest that my former colleague’s lack of belief represents a minor symptom of a much wider trend. Part of the explanation for the current malaise is a crisis of belief among those who, in the past, provided a framework of ideas which helped to shape the social order and give meaning to the daily transactions between individuals and groups. To forestall misunderstanding, two qualifications are immediately necessary.
Firstly, I am not referring specifically to religious belief though, as will be seen, that is certainly part of the picture. And secondly, I am not calling for a return to a prescriptive set of values defined from above and enforced on those below by various means of social control. On the contrary, my argument is that a healthy democracy requires a range of clearly articulated sets of values, representing different visions of the good life, which enable individuals to form their own views on what matters. In the absence of such sets of values, the way is left open for the meretricious to exploit the weak and the scene is set for serious social fracture. Let me try to illustrate this argument with reference to three groups who might be expected to represent positive belief systems – politicians, professionals and church leaders.
Lawyers are a particularly good example of professionals who routinely retreat to processes when what it is really needed is an analysis of first principles.
In the political sphere we have witnessed ‘the death of ideology’ following the dismantling of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet bloc. The old struggle between capitalism and socialism has, it is often argued, been replaced by a more balanced recognition of the important contributions of both private and public sectors. For a time the phrase ‘the third way’ gained currency. But look at what this has meant for Britain.
The difference between the main parties has been blurred to the point where, on many issues, they are barely distinguishable. Tony Blair morphed easily into Tory Blair. David Cameron has performed so many U-turns that it is difficult to identify any coherent direction of travel. At best, he might be described as a confused pragmatist, lurching from ‘hug a hoodie’ to a call for exemplary sentences. The end of ideology has simply produced a political scene that lacks clear landmarks and reference points. Add the expenses scandal and it is little wonder that politicians are no longer seen as credible sources of vision and purpose. It is potentially a very dangerous situation, leaving the way open for populist extremist groups to claim to offer a way through the morass.
What about the professional classes – doctors, nurses, teachers, social workers? Here a distinction should be made between front-line staff, who generally try to do a decent job, often in difficult circumstances, and senior managers who should, but often fail to, provide intellectual leadership. The latter, in too many cases, have abandoned principles in favour of procedures. They are the architects of endless lists of guidelines, checklists, protocols and policy documents. Challenge them to express a view on a serious ethical issue and you are unlikely to get anything more than a recycled passage of rhetorical flannel. Lawyers are a particularly good example of professionals who routinely retreat to processes when what it is really needed is an analysis of first principles. It is symptomatic that most law students regard jurisprudence, which is concerned with the theory and philosophy of the law, as one of the less attractive parts of their course.
For centuries religion was the major source of belief for most people but here too we witness – certainly in the West – a loss of confidence in its basic tenets. Many members of the clergy have suffered a crisis of faith, abandoning belief in a conventional God, and lacking conviction when asked to specify exactly what they do believe in. The mainstream churches have turned inward, devoting too much time and energy to factional disputes which fail to engage with wider philosophical and social questions. There has, it is true, been a growth in some fundamentalist movements but they constitute a small minority and represent a threat to serious, reasoned engagement with the spiritual dimension of human experience. Like the political extremists, they have little to offer by way of insight into the best means of rebuilding a society destabilised by anger and division.
In the absence of coherent belief systems to serve as guides to human action, it is little wonder that other, less worthy, motivations come to the surface – ruthless ambition, material acquisitiveness, destructive envy. Lives shaped by the celebrity trash which pollutes our television screens on a daily basis are unlikely to be transformed by belated calls for moral renewal. The immediate outlook is bleak.
Prior to his retirement Walter Humes held professorships at the universities of Aberdeen, Strathclyde and West of Scotland. He is now a visiting professor of education at the University of Stirling
