Criminals across the UK have greeted the news of radical cutbacks in Britain's police service with a resounding thumbs up.
"That'll do for me," Freddie 'Fatfingers' Kosilikit of the Russian Mafia told us. "They're a pain in the arse, the Dibble. It's about time somebody cut back on them. They're an obstruction to good business practices. Now we may be able to get back to earning some decent wonga without unnecessary interference."
Leading Con-Dem politicians have lauded the cutbacks as a necessary step in the continuing battle of good against evil. One leading player said that anti-social behaviour and violent crime were nothing more than figments of a paranoid public's collective imagination.
As were serial killers and terrorists.
Speaking from his country pile in Gloucestershire, he said that he had not, at any point witnessed such carrying on.
The government proposed yesterday that all citizens should be issued with warrant cards, pointy helmets, whistles and truncheons so that they could sort out their own problems without interference from the law.
And riot shields in run down inner city neighbourhoods.
Sir Robert Peel was reportedly turning in his grave.
More as we get it.
