"Let me post my colours to the mast instantly when I say I believe that immigration to our country is healthy and wealthy for the British citizen, apart from being humane, especially when the newcomer and their family come from war-torn countries in search of a better life. However, the mere size of our island dictates that it is only sensible to both the immigrant and the native to our shores that such immigration is controlled and managed by the British Government.
When I was a young Probation Officer in my first few years of service, it was customary and a vital part of our training that we have a periodical placement with other agencies in order to familiarise oneself with the manner of their work and the difficulties that crossed agency lines of differing responsibilities. Hence, we would usually spend two weeks to one month attached to the Prisons, the Police, the Social Services Department and also to Psychiatrists or Psychologists.
One evening whilst accompanying a police control car on its rounds, an emergency call was made to attend a domestic row which had become too serious for a next-door neighbour not to phone for police intervention before serious violence was caused to one of the rowing parties. When we arrived at the scene, we could hear the man screaming at his female partner inside the house and then a window crashed with an object having broken it. The shouting and screaming suddenly stopped as a woman opened the front door. Her head was bleeding profusely; presumably from a physical assault, as she indicated to the two police patrol officers that her cohabitee was running across the fields at the back of their house wielding a hammer that he had hit her on the skull with. 'He ...he tried to kill me!' the woman told the police officers, adding, 'Two minutes later and I'd have been dead!'
As the assailant ran away across the fields armed with a hammer which he'd already shown he was not afraid to use, I expected at least one of the police officers to give chase, catch the culprit and make an arrest. They simply made a decision to let him escape as they called an ambulance for the injured woman. When I later asked the officers why one didn't give immediate pursuit, the most senior officer replied, 'Too dangerous for both us, him and the woman he assaulted!' He then explained that the man was known to the police and had a string of violent offences, many against the same woman who had cohabited with him for over six years. I was told that for the police to confront him at the height of his anger was highly dangerous as they could not estimate the degree of violence he would respond with once surrounded. The police officer also told me they were regularly called out to the same house after domestic violence had broken out and every time they arrested the man, his cohabitee invariably refused to give evidence against him to the sentencing court at the eleventh hour. She was so fearful that he would kill her if she testified against him that she always took him back.
Before that night's shift had ended, during our canteen break the officer explained by saying, 'We didn't want to escalate the risk of further violence by giving chase and pursuing an arrest. Our police training informs us that the actions of any frightened person who is backed into a corner are wholly unpredictable and highly dangerous. The first thing they will do is to try to escape, but if you chase them, there's no telling what they will do! That's why hunters never chase a wounded beast.'
During recent years as masses of immigrants have risked life and limb to escape hostile situations, crossing seas in overcrowded boats unworthy for the passage, and often drowning in their attempt to reach the shores of greater freedom, the overall situation of global mass migration has worried me enormously. I don't profess to know the answer as to how our country should respond, I cannot condemn any migrant who feels trapped not to try and escape the negative consequences of their situation. Were I ever to find myself and family in a similar situation, I would do everything and anything to improve the lot of myself and family.
To see any creature who is trapped and removed from the benefit of their natural resources is to see a creature who is prepared to jump through any gap that offers instant freedom. Think not too unkindly upon those who choose to migrate to greener pastures when their land grows barren and denies access to only the strong, the most powerful and the wealthy, for it is a most natural part of any parent to seek improvement for their offspring where it can be found." William Forde: October 3rd, 2018.