to wonder what is happening to London!?

[AisforAria]

Anyone else worried about the sudden rise in acid attacks, moped thieves etc? It feels a bit like the rule of law is breaking down. All this simmering violence - London feels really alien and hostile these days.

I do think though, that the current situation is terrifying, and I no longer feel at all safe or at ease anywhere in London.

I don't think it's just you Argeles, but I think you're part of a selective band

London is being hollowed out from the middle. Epic scale housing crisis affecting all tenures from social housing tenants through to upper middle class buyers. Austerity. Social cleansing.

Also population turnover. London has always been a cosmopolitan city attractive to incomers. But that was balanced with "local" families. Most true Londoners from longstanding London families have now left or are thinking about it. The younger MCs are going elsewhere, the WCs can't secure housing either. So there's a lot of churn and no ballast. All change really. It's unsettling.

I got that reply to argeles completely wrong. I do think it's just her and she is part of a selective band of terrified people who feel unsafe and ill at ease in London.

I agree with SerfTerf to a large extent. Though I'm not so sentimental about local families and true Londoners - who the fuck are 'true Londoners'?. I moved here 25 years ago. Some people of the people born and bred round here still don't like it or me. Fuck 'em. This is where I live and most of them have benefited from right to buy in central London so they can fuck right off.

The single biggest factor driving Moped crimes has come about because they know once they remove their helmets the police are no longer authorized to target them in chases.

I would think the minute the police are allowed to start taking them out as they rob victims you'll probably start to see that particular crime drop its become apparent the police have to be allowed to be proactive in targeting them.

The level of violence and lack of respect for anyone is extremely worrying. These kids seem to lack any empathy. I mean.....at 12/18 going around throwing acid at innocent people is ridiclous.

It's not that the police are not allowed to chase them it's that they will be prosecuted it they hurt them

Yes they are worried they may be prosecuted. As it stands if they remove any head gear they cannot get authority to continue the pursuit the scumbags are well aware and remove helmets the minute the police show up. The stats bear this out too.

London is festooned with CCTV. More than any place in the world. I saw a senior Met officer say today that they might not give chase but they would follow it up and knock on someone's door at 3am. I have to trust to that.

As a Londoner, I'd prefer they did that rather than being the poor sap who got mown down crossing the road by people playing cops and robbers.

They know once they remove their helmets the police are no longer authorized to target them in chases...the minute the police are allowed to start taking them out...you'll probably start to see that particular crime drop its become apparent the police have to be allowed to be proactive in targeting them

WTF? It's not GTA. Real life innocent bystanders get killed when people play cops and robbers on the streets. You might not care about that, but I'd rather not be mown down for a stolen moped.

It's nothing to do with thieves taking their helmets off so the police don't chase them. It's to do with the police not wanting to hurt me or you in pursuit of people who will be on camera in the most monitored city in the world and who can be picked up if the resources and will are there.

I feel that is the safest and most sensible solution

@limitedperiodonly I meant anything other than this new thing of supposedly being a Londoner the second you step off the plane or train, I suppose. Some degree of long termism, be it generations or decades.

I know the "instant Londoner" thing is supposed to be inclusive and buoyant and all of that, but I think it adds to the growing sense of transience.

I've lived in a handful of cities besides London, which is my home city and I've never been anywhere else that embraces impermanence quite like London does now. Can you imagine Edinburgh or Bristol or Mancs or anywhere else at all embracing every temporary resident as a native? It's nice to be welcoming but at a certain point it's just destabilising.

A lot of the change has been driven by greed, of course, and so "instant Londoner" is a helpful narrative to cover some of the more unpleasant aspects of what's happened in the past two decades, from the Canary Wharf development to Grenfell Tower. But it devalues the brand.

A city needs to maintain some core sense of itself to be healthy, I think, and some continuity. Maybe it's more noticeable to me because I've gone and returned four times now.

limitedperiodonly, you are wrong....

One of my best friends was targeted by two guys on moped's at 6pm in Chelsea.
She was walking home with her two young children, when she noticed two men on a moped drive very slowly past her. They mounted the pavement in front of her and as she ran away, the man on the back, tackled her and pinned her to the ground.
She was fighting him off until her pulled a knife to her throat and robbed her of her jewellery.

The police concur with what nova said, they're not allowed to chase them - the muggers pull their helmets off and the police have to stand down. The moped's have been stolen, or have fake licence plates on them, and are subsequently dumped. How exactly are the police going to apprehend these guys?!

This happened in broad daylight about two weeks ago. They target young women and women with children as they're unlikely to "fight" back, and are distracted (on phones, children etc)

The 7 and 5 year olds were traumatised by what happened right outside their house. They're now petrified to walk anywhere, and their mother has delayed shock.

It's horrendous that this is happening on the streets in London, and I'm scared for my child because of the rise in knife and acid attacks.

Not saying we should all go into a mass panic etc., but it seems that there really has been an increase in violent crime in London, Manchester and some other cities in the last couple of years. Esp. knife crime.

The "instant/true Londoner" thing---yes, I do know what you mean.

A high churn rate in a city will probably lead to deteriorating social trust, which can both push up crime and also push up the fear of crime, making people doubly uneasy.

Very well put @MaryTheCanary

I'm an immigrant myself but the last time I visited London I stayed in a certain area where we hired an AirBnB, I felt like I was in Africa. I don't care about the people's race, I'm not white myself, but they certainly didn't behave like they had assimilated into the English culture. And the shopping centre I went in near the Tube station was really horrible, dirty and again felt like I was in a third world country. I also had a woman who shouted she would slap me aggressively because she bumped into me while I was letting a couple with a buggy sort themselves out at the Tube station. Like it or not London has changed. I believe in accepting immigrants, butlike Australia, this country needs to be selective on whom they let in.

Serfterf you make a very good point. I think I have one 'true Londoner' left in London all my other childhood friends have moved out. By true Londoner I mean born & raised, if I moved to Manchester or Edinburgh as Mary says I don't think I could ever call myself a true Mancunian etc.

Also I think there is a much bigger divide now & less of a community feel. My primary school had a very diverse socioeconomic background & catchment areas were less of an issue. I have jut gone through the process with my eldest & the catchment area of the primary was 250m. Obvs to be in that catchment you have to pay ££££ for your house.

Where I really notice it is a road not too far from me where the homes (admittedly large & beautiful) sell for 3 million +. There is a secondary school on that road, not one family who live in the catchment send their kids there. The homeowners are 95% white, the kids who go to the school are 95% BME. I just think it's weird.

Fear of crime is always far higher than actual crime

For all the people saying nothing has changed I suggest you don't try walking through certain areas in London.

Grenfell may have been criminal.

Too, can we talk about corporate crime? Domestic violence? Or just scooter offenses.

I recently moved out of London but still work there and I can't wait to leave.

I am still a member of my old area's local Facebook group and see constant posts of there from victims or witnesses of moped gangs, even videos filmed by witnesses. This rise has happened quite suddenly in that area, it must be really scary for people living there.

Shocked at so many people saying nothing has changed. Not a single day goes by where at there aren't at least 3 incidences reported on local sites (with accompanying video footage or pictures) the police are doing nothing at all and these groups are evolving into vigilante groups now. I'm in East London/Essex border area and the problem is very big and very real here. Acid and large knives are being used to threaten people during muggings, cars are surrounded by kids on mopeds at traffic lights or they wait around blind corners to pen them in.

I'm the first to tell people to get a grip when it comes to local crime/terrorism/whatever but this recent spate is much more frequent and much more serious.

What's happening in London?
People are working, children are going to school, tourists are mixing up London Bridge and Tower Bridge and the Tube is hot. People are enjoying the parks, having a cheeky drink after work, seeing the sites and avoiding the bicycles.
It's London, it's a beautiful, crazy place and I love it.

In the last month I've seen a boy have his phone snatched from him in a McDonalds (don't judge me, sometimes one needs a chicken sandwich). Witnessed a boy have his phone snatched on the road & also seen a tourist have their suitcase taken when the placed it down near an ATM on Regents street. This were all in broad daylight & busy areas. It happens so quickly that I think most people don't even notice it until after the event.

Sorry for typos, using left hand.

many you sound like an idiot with your reference to 'English culture '
We live in a multicultural society .
Multiculturalism is the norm round here .
You could always go to Australia if it's too African and third world ish around here .

I don't think this sort of crime is going to be a massive issue in central London so reference to visits to south bank aren't really very useful. But in individual boroughs it seems to be on the rise. I work in the city and live in SE London but quite close to central - zone 2.

There is an issue with gang crime, historically and recently getting worse. The local Facebook group reports things that don't get into the media including attempted attacks on women walking home in broad daylight.

Farage and Hopkins spread hate which is fuelled by some papers. If you want to pretend fuelling hatred and encouraging violence won't have an impact go for it. One of the acid attacks was aimed specifically at Muslim girls. Hate crimes have increased. A bloody ambulance driver was waved down and had liquid thrown at her - thankfully not acid. But no, nothing to do with a country relying on division to push through the governments agenda 🙄