Is bigger really better?

Kate Moss won't be charged with drug abuse because prosecutors can't be sure which drug she was using when she was filmed on a mobile phone. Fiona Phillips comments in the Mirror -

The case cost up to £250,000, which no doubt we'll pick up in taxes. Thanks a bunch, Kate. So glad to hear you're earning thousands a day while we have to stump up for your misdemeanours.

Probably it won't mean higher taxes, but other alleged crimes will have gone uninvestigated. How could an experienced drug squad spend anything like that amount when the problem of evidence should have been obvious to them at the outset?

It's the police who wasted our money, not Kate Moss. A bit more democratic say over their priorities wouldn't come amiss.

And the Met is the largest force in the country. The whole basis of the government's proposals to merge forces is that larger forces are more professional.

This carefree profligacy makes that assumption look rocky.