Language skills Extras Explore 8 Big brother is watching you 101 Read part 1 of the article. 1 Where is the writer and why is he there? 2 Does he think CCTV cameras are useful or useless? What evidence can you find in the article to support this? 3 How does his attitude change in the second paragraph? 4 Who runs the operation? Why does that seem to be a good idea? Reading 3 a In Manchester, I watch the man as he fumbles in his pocket, rolls a cigarette and lights it. He is young, thin, and seems nervous. He also seems oblivious to the camera through which I am watching him. He is outside, in the city centre; I am in front of a bank of screens, at the NCP car park. This is the control centre for Manchester’s CCTV camera surveillance operation: five operators controlling over 250 cameras, covering public spaces throughout the greater Manchester area 24 hours a day. One of the operators had noticed something unusual about our man, but his suspicions, honed by hours of watching street activity, were soon allayed, and his attention turned elsewhere. At one end of the screens, an operator is observing the car park. A police officer is on shift for referrals for action. The operation has had its successes: nearly 50 football hooligans rampaging in the city centre before the UEFA cup final between Rangers and Zenit St Petersburg have been identified; mobile wireless cameras have assisted in a successful police operation against gangs in Moss Side. It is not always so exciting. The operator showed me his computerised log of recent incidents: a man on a garage forecourt looking at the camera, a group of youths on bicycles, someone acting suspiciously here, a shoplifter being brought out of a shop there. The centre’s manager is keen to stress that CCTV is there “to improve the quality of life, not just to catch criminals.” The cameras are alert to fly-tipping, traffic congestion, illegal street traders. “We want to be the fourth emergency service, watching out for the people of Manchester,” the manager says. She also thinks this collection of functions and separation of powers between council and police is the proper model for CCTV, allowing checks and balances. Certainly, to the observer, the operation smacks more of the familiar British piecemeal pragmatism than any sinister desire for control. Read part 2 of the article. Talk in pairs. 1 Does the writer of the article think surveillance cameras have helped to reduce crime? 2 What do you think might be the reasons for this? b But that, say the critics of CCTV, is the problem: the House of Lords’ constitutional committee recently noted that there was no regulatory framework for adequate protections against invasion of privacy by CCTV. No-one even knows how many cameras there are in Britain. The best guess is over four million. CCTV is reckoned to operate in around 500 British towns and cities, as against 50 in Italy, 11 in Austria, and one in Norway. Professor Clive Norris, head of the department of sociological studies at Sheffield University, thinks public funding explains much of the difference. During the 1990s, roughly 75% of the Home Office crimeprevention budget is said to have been spent on installing CCTV, even though no-one can be sure that it works: “The primary justification for CCTV is the reduction of crime. There has been a singular failure to produce evidence that it has achieved that.” Norris quotes case studies in Australia and the United States showing CCTV’s paltry success in leading to prosecutions. Police hours spent going through the tapes must also be considered. It has also been shown that improving street lighting “is a rather more effective form of prevention.” Meanwhile, the hunt for all the identified Manchester hooligans is still continuing, a year later. Nur zu Prüfzwecken – Eigentum des Verlags öbv
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy ODE3MDE=