SHADOW Home Secretary Chris Grayling has said Britain's streets are like a real-life version of violent cop show The Wire after claiming to have witnessed 'urban warfare' in Moss Side.
Grayling said that Britain now suffers from the same culture of drugs, gang and gun crime found in the US in a speech he was making in Westminster.
Speaking of a visit he made to south Manchester on June 26, he said: "A few weeks ago, I spent one of the most illuminating evenings that I have had since entering politics out with the specialist police team in Manchester's Moss Side that works to tackle the gang issues in the area.
"Even as someone well aware of the gang problem in our society, it was a shocking and enlightening experience. What was going on there at the time was nothing short of an urban war.
Troublemaker
"A local troublemaker, recently released from prison, was on the streets trying to reassert his status. Rivalry between local gangs had flared up into all out conflict. In the ensuing conflict a local gang member had been shot through the upstairs window of a house and was seriously ill in hospital.
"We saw the bullet hole in the window through which the shot had passed. The previous evening the homes of two members of the gang responsible for the shooting had been smashed up by their rivals in an act of revenge. We saw the broken windows and the smashed up doors."
He went on to say that the culture of violence In Britain mirrored what had been seen in the USA a generation ago.
"It’s the world of the drama series The Wire," he said.
But Det Supt Darren Shenton, who heads Greater Manchester Police's Xcalibre anti-gang crime unit, said that the term urban war was a `really sensationalistic term' when gang-related shootings had plummeted by 82 per cent on the previous year's figures.
And Home Secretary Alan Johnson accused his Tory shadow of trying to sound “cool” with “glib references” to TV shows.
He said: “Chris Grayling should be praising the police for continued reduction in gun-related offences, rather than talking Britain down.
“The connection between The Wire and Chris Grayling’s grasp on the problems of modern Britain is that they’re both fictional.
“The serious problems being tackled in our communities will not be diminished by his embarrassing habit of making glib references to television programmes that he thinks will make him sound ’cool’.”
Critically-acclaimed drama The Wire, currently screened on BBC2, follows gangsters in inner city Baltimore and the police officers trying to bring them down.
The show paints a bleak picture of communities where drug dealing and drug addiction are rife and revenge murders are commonplace.
The government has said it is helping areas blighted by high crime and that crime rates have fallen by 36 per cent since it came to power.
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Mr Manchester (25/08/2009 at 12:37)
It's far easier for him to rake over sensationalist media labels from years ago than to give credit for the enormous progress made by local hardworking people.
J. Peasmold Gruntfuttock, King of Peasmouldia (25/08/2009 at 12:50)
You obviously didn't see this story not so long back..
www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/s/1131836_duchess_talks_about_life_on_the_estate
joanne card, manchester (25/08/2009 at 12:52)
no worries, unless your a crack dealer or a tory MP
Mr Manchester (25/08/2009 at 12:52)
Steinbrock, Bury (25/08/2009 at 12:53)
Labour have failed Britain, failed the north west and failed Manchester.
Labour have engendered a society based on welfare-dependency, killing the futures and potential ambitions of many generations of families and children.
born a blue, die a blue, droylsden (25/08/2009 at 12:57)
That bit of fluff, under the sofa (25/08/2009 at 13:02)
you may be right but you can't deny that Labour just isn't working is it?
Thank goodness for today's news that the Conservatives are "the public's overwhelming choice to form the next government". Hurrah, we'll soon be back to the glory days of the Blessed Margaret Thatcher - when Britains could hold up their heads and be proud.
Gary SK13 (25/08/2009 at 13:04)
Mr Manchester (25/08/2009 at 13:06)
As for my comment, I'd say exactly the same if it was Labour or Conservative spouting his inane drivel.
Almighty God, Salford (25/08/2009 at 13:10)
Seriously, they have a lot more planned than just things involving trees. www.greenparty.org.uk/policies.html
Guten Tag, Manchester (25/08/2009 at 13:11)
john davis, Broughton, Salford (25/08/2009 at 13:12)
Esso Blue., Manchester (25/08/2009 at 13:14)
Drew-Peacock, Our House (25/08/2009 at 13:27)
Steinbrock, Bury (25/08/2009 at 13:31)
As I say, Labour has failed the poor of this country and I know where my vote will be going in the next election.
Labour -NEVER AGAIN.
David of Ashton, Ashton (25/08/2009 at 13:46)
Greek feeder, Whalley range (25/08/2009 at 13:48)
dessie, manchester (25/08/2009 at 13:58)
That bit of fluff, under the sofa (25/08/2009 at 13:58)
castlefieldres, manchester (25/08/2009 at 13:59)
Gary SK13,
25/08/2009 at 13:04
What utter rubbish and part of the reason we're finding it so hard to sort areas like Moss Side out. It's almost like 'well we can call them, but that toff he aint got a clue.'
Pathetic.
So anyone who thinks the Conservatives may do a better job, may be better on crime etc, needs their head looking at do they?
Perhaps you're correct though. Perhaps Cameron would see over a period that saw a new British underclass develop,
Where the welfare state got so out of out control that people were better off out of work,
Where any child who can spell thinks they should go to University, so those that don't go, like many in Moss Side, are almost pushed aside,
An era where violent crime went through the roof but stats were changed to hide it,
An era where people were allowed to borrow to excess to fund lifestyles and then able to cancel off debts because they cannot afford them, showing the children of these areas a total lack of responsibility,
An era where politicians would lie like never before to get their own way and bend the truth accordingly, even if Goverment experts were hounded to their death for daring to tell the truth.
Oh - wait a minute isn't that what we've just had?
You saying this guy isn't able to share a widely held opinion because he's a bit posh and well educated and probably wears double cuffs - is like me saying don't comment on the city as you're from Glossop, stick to your little rural views.
Moss Side has major problems, anyone can see that.
You drive down there tonight.
d1v1s1onby0, Wigan (25/08/2009 at 14:16)
"Yep"
Now give the cops the same hardware they get on The Wire, and start imposing the same sentances on crooks that the US does, before it gets any worse.
Zoomer, The Real World (25/08/2009 at 14:22)
fed up with it, sale (25/08/2009 at 14:43)
Elliott Pest, Newton, Nr. Hyde. (25/08/2009 at 15:42)
Its just a pity he didn't visit other parts of Greater Manchester
...Salford, Ardwick, Gorton, just to name 3. His opinion would have been much the same as it was for Moss Side.
And there's nothing more certain, this country is going to have a Conservative Government at the next GE so the fed-up's of this country better get used to the idea.
Come-On-City. Paris, France. (25/08/2009 at 15:59)
So this Tory toff is comparing Moss Side to a fictitious piece of trash that he watched on television? Lets be clear Manchester, in general, has its problems - but for the vast majority of the time its a relatively safe place to be. It has its problem areas, Moss Side being one of them. These problem areas largely being drug gang related or full of chav kids which could be solved if the politicians really cared.
However compared to the city I grew up in, or even the suburbs of Paris, the problem areas of Manchester just dont compare. In America and the suburbs of Paris there are places in which you just do not go, there are places where the police just do not go. This is not an exaggeration.