About 30,000 police officers across all forces in England and Wales are to be trained to use Taser stun guns.
Currently, only specialist firearms officers carry the weapon, which can temporarily disable a suspect.
But ministers will announce plans later to buy 10,000 more Tasers and extend their use to all frontline officers.
Barely a day goes by without you reading some news story from America or Canada about someone being killed by the police with a taser. Here's a video of someone dying from it.
Here's a news story about UK police tasering a guy in a diabetic coma.
Here's Amnesty International UK's report on taser deaths
Here's a list of everyone who's died after being shot by a taser in Canada.
Can we please not have it in the UK?
How can we stop it from coming to pass? Who do I vote for? Come the next general election, regardless of the financial crisis, which party do I vote for if my sole overriding concern is to stop the UK police from having tasers?
Do I have to join the police force, excell in brown-nosing, rise through the ranks, become a chief inspector and then in a meeting say 'no'. Or can I just vote for someone to stop this.
How many people must die?
Here's Engadget with a taser-proof jacket.
Your question about voting to stop tasers is an interesting one, and it does heighten a problem with representative democracies - that in elections, you might find yourself faced with candidates you agree with one some things but not on others. Like... from other things you say, you seem kind of down on big government, so it would be a problem if a big government party ran a clear "No Tasers!" policy.
ReplyDeleteThat said, Labour are surely the official Big Government party. Haven't the Tories gone all civil liberties recently? Maybe they will be against tasers. The Liberals might in theory, but they are so hard to pin down in practice.