London's burning

I had the chance yesterday evening to witness one of these street riots live (a ten minute walk away). There were two police helicopters in the air, and the whole neighbourhood was talking of nothing else.

The air of excitement was palpable. I shrugged my middle-aged shoulders and thought well, I'll see it better on the telly, and trudged off to where I live.

So what on earth is happening? "It's just criminality" is the quote so frequently trotted out. Well murder is just criminality for crying out loud. It's a phrase that means anything you want it to mean, but is guaranteed to garner popular headlines and popular support from an outraged if mystified public. This doesn't constitute informed opinion. For further thoughts on this, read Penny Red's blog.

Yesterday I had next to no sympathy for what these people were up to on account of the fact that they didn't seem to know what they wanted and were robbing phone shops and, for instance, Footlocker. I felt that in Tottenham last Saturday they had hijacked a grieving family's protest.

These people don't need a manifesto and, clearly, to take to the streets in such numbers and wreak havoc in the way that they have been, requires motivation a little stronger than the desire for a new Blackberry.

The Metropolitan Police have described the events of Monday as "the worst disorder in current memory". Condemnation is easy to muster. It is thirty years since we've seen riots on the streets anything like this (yes I do remember) and they were just not on this scale.

I'm old school enough to have marched in support of the miners. I've stood and shouted outside the House of Commons in support of, or against, one cause or another. Years ago I was part of a group who occupied the headquarters of the old National Graphical Association overnight in protest at Mrs Thatcher's attempt to abolish it. (The NGA was an old print union.)

But isn't this almost a new form of civil unrest? This is some kind of political statement. It might not seem like it and most of those taking part would be hard pushed to define precisely what it was. Partly, they are doing it because they can.