Read Online The Verge Practice by Barry Maitland - Free Book Online Page B

they were all young.
    ‘Let’s turn to the agenda, shall we?’ Desmond suggested.
    ‘I’ve put the program as the first item, because that is the most critical thing at present. Our immediate deadline is the next meeting of the Joint Conference in three weeks.
    Each of the working parties will be expected to present an interim working paper at the conference, with some initial analysis and ideas . . .’
    There was a buzz of consternation round the table.
    ‘Three weeks?’ ‘That’s ridiculous!’ ‘Are you joking?’
    ‘I know, I know,’ Desmond said soothingly. ‘It’s just unfortunate how the timing has worked out. Believe me, I’m as concerned about it as you. As chair, I’ll be the one who has to present our paper.’
    Rex had been silent up to this point, but now he cleared his throat loudly and the murmur died away. Kathy noticed that he was resting his clenched fist on a newspaper folded to a large colour photograph. She recognised it because it had been in the paper she’d been reading on the tube into work that morning, a picture of the family of an Asian boy trampled by a police horse during a riot up north over the weekend.
    ‘We cannot be steamrolled,’ he said, in a deep, powerful voice that held everyone’s attention, ‘by some ridiculously short, artificial deadline, into producing half-baked ideas.
    I didn’t agree to join this committee on those terms.’
    ‘Yeah, that’s right.’ Jay nodded her cropped head vigorously. ‘Of course, Rex, but I don’t think . . .’ Desmond tried to calm things down, but the Sikh hadn’t finished.
    ‘There are a number of basic issues we have to address before we can even begin to think about producing statements. Such as the make-up of this committee.’
    Kathy realised she wasn’t the only one who’d been studying that. But how could he object to it?
    Desmond clearly thought the same. ‘Well, I wasn’t involved in the selection process, Rex, but I must say, looking at who’s here, that it seems extremely well balanced.
    I think Robert and whoever else was involved have done a pretty good job.’
    ‘The fact that it’s so evenly balanced makes the position of chair especially crucial. Presumably the chair has a casting vote, right?’
    ‘The aim is to reach consensus, Rex. I would hope that we don’t ever have to get to the stage of taking votes . . .’
    ‘All the same, the chair is important, symbolically and practically.’ Rex was sitting very upright and still, not meeting their eyes, but staring down at the newspaper by his hand as he spoke. ‘And right away we’re giving the wrong message by having the committee chaired by a member of the police. I thought the whole point of this exercise was to listen to the community?’
    ‘Yeah,’ Jay agreed, watching Rex with interest.
    ‘But the community just isn’t going to give credibility to policies coming from committees set up and chaired by the police, with a few token community reps to make them look respectable.’
    Desmond took a deep breath. ‘I wasn’t involved in the decision-making process that led to my appointment as chair. Can you throw any light on the thinking behind that, Robert?’
    Robert looked mildly surprised to be brought into the scrap, but he smiled benignly and said, ‘Well, I rather think that the argument is that this whole exercise is being carried out by the Metropolitan Police in order to improve its performance and level of service to the community at large.
    So it is essentially a police process, informed by the highest possible level of input from community representatives, whose contributions will of course be absolutely crucial.
    The chair of each committee must have an understanding of the context within which new policies will be framed. In other words, the chairs must understand how the police service operates, and must be able to present the ideas of their committees in a way that the police hierarchy can understand and take on