THE word from the Law in the early sixties was that Britain was becoming more and more lawless, as crime figures went up, and up.
Indeed, the police were concerned that more and more ‘amateurs’ were indulging in crime, believing that it really did pay.
And the finger of blame was pointed in just one direction – television!
The culprit was revealed by the men who supervised the police, the Inspectors of Constabulary, when they made their annual report to the Home Secretary.
It showed that indictable offences known to the police in 1961 numbered 806,900, an increase of more than 63,000 over the previous year.
The report blamed much of the increase on TV programmes, stating: “The portrayal of crime plays a disproportionate part in the entertainment of the public and, in consequence, much objective anti-crime propaganda is dissipated by the glamour with which crime and criminals are put forward for the entertainment of the public.”
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