Illegal street parties are proliferating across London and the rest of the UK as the country emerges from lockdown

Following a string of illegal rave parties across London, the Metropolitan Police is scrambling to revive traditional methods of mitigating the problem.

The illegal parties pose a double problem for the Met in so far as they constitute a breach of social distancing rules in addition to posing an acute social order challenge.

These challenges came into sharp relief on Friday night as Met officers struggled to break up an illegal rave party on Harrow Road, Kensal Town.

The revelers swiftly moved on to nearby Maida Vale and did not disperse until well after midnight, sparking dozens of complaints from local residents.

But the worst disturbance so far occurred in Brixton on the evening of June 24 when hundreds of revelers at an illegal street party clashed with Met Police leaving twenty-two police officers injured.

Following the wide scale disturbance, Boris Johnson�s official spokesman told the media the government is planning to launch a consultation on "doubling the maximum [prison] sentence" for assaulting an emergency worker, including Met officers.

But in a sign the Met Police is adopting a softer approach than Downing Street, Met Commander, Bas Javid, has claimed the police are "building relationships" with local communities with a view to containing the threats posed by illegal street parties.

Talking to BBC Breakfast, Javid said: "The first line is engagement and building relationships, and you don�t do that by walking into every situation with riot helmets and shields".

"We need to build relationships, we need to make sure we engage effectively with communities and we�re only as good or as effective as our relationship with those communities ", Javid added.

It remains to be seen whether the Met�s insistence on traditional policing by consent will prevail over Downing Street�s insistence on a tough approach on illegal street parties during what has already been described as a "summer of discontent".

SOURCE: PRESS TV

LINK: https://www.ansarpress.com/english/18925

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