Bill Carmichael: What a waste of police resources

Indeed, in 28 years on the road the charge sheet against him reads a single parking ticket and three points on his licence for inadvertently running a red light.

Yet last week Mr Phillips and a group of parents like him were the focus of what must be the most extraordinary police operation seen in Yorkshire for many years.

The South Yorkshire force dispatched nine officers plus a riot van to deal with this group. What were they? Bank robbers, terrorists, or drug dealers? No, they were ordinary mothers and fathers who turned up at Hilltop Special School in Maltby to pick up their severely disabled children.

That's right folks, the force that tells us it "doesn't have the resources" to combat crime and anti-social behaviour devoted an enormous part of its manpower to deal with a minor parking problem.

What's worse is this heavy handed intervention was entirely

unnecessary – the school was already aware of the concerns of residents and a meeting had been organised to sort out the problem.

This episode hit the headlines on the same day as a scathing report

from HM Inspector of Constabulary, Sir Denis O'Connor.

Sir Denis accused British police of retreating from the streets and abandoning vulnerable people to the mercy of feral mobs who effectively control housing estates across the country. The police response? A predictable "we don't have the resources".

Back at Hilltop School, police resources don't seem to be an issue. Mr Phillips has parked in the same spot each school day for the last 12 years without a problem. He admits he had two wheels on the pavement – this is because his vehicle needs to be level to operate a wheelchair ramp that swings out 1.5 metres from a side door. With all four wheels on the highway the camber of the road means he can't use the mechanism.

He explained this to a woman police officer who had charmlessly told him to "move it". She then shrugged saying: "It's not my problem" before issuing him with a 30 ticket. Where on earth do they recruit these people?

Mr Phillips told me: "I'm lucky in that my lad, although he's in a wheelchair, is fit and healthy and we can afford to pay the fine. But there's a lot of very poorly children at that school. Some of them need constant oxygen. And there are single parents who can ill afford 30. Imagine one of these mums struggling with heavy oxygen bottles and pushing a disabled child in a wheelchair the 150 yards where they told us to park."

I highlight this case not to bash the police. We ask them to do a tough and sometimes dangerous job and, when they choose to do it, they deserve our admiration and support. But clearly something has turned rotten at the heart of British policing.

When you have terrified pensioners cowed before a baying mob at the front door, while the police officers we pay to protect them instead spend their days bullying law-abiding citizens, you know something has gone catastrophically wrong.

It's not about "resources". It's about priorities. It's about values.

Sir Denis's report is called "Stop the Rot" – let's hope someone in the police service is paying attention.

Blinkered vision

Journalists have a responsibility to report the news fairly and accurately and without any political bias. Give people the facts and let them make up their own minds.

Yet unions at the BBC have called strikes next week in a deliberate attempt to black out coverage of speeches by David Cameron and George Osborne at the Conservative Party Conference.

Reporters should not be in the business of trying to withhold information from the public.

Any journalist who joins this politically motivated strike waves

goodbye to any vestige of impartiality and sends a message to the audience that they can no longer be trusted.