CLIVE SMITH: Police are giving thieving scumbags free reign

As the stabbings and acid attacks continue in the capital, the Met Police arrested a 78-year-old man on suspicion of murder after defending himself against two burglars, one of whom died. Fortunately he has now been released without charge.

But no wonder things are in such a state. I’ve got no sympathy for the burglar, in fact I’m playing the world’s smallest violin for him.

Had he not been in someone else’s property he would still be going about his business now.

If you were forced into your kitchen and were being threatened, what are you meant to do? Maybe he should have just let them ransack his home and steal all the possessions he worked hard for without causing a fuss. It’s ridiculous.

So much for having a right to defend yourself in your own home.

It’s too easy to commit crime like this in this country.

No-one in authority really cares about it, they’re more interested in creating task forces for hate crime.

The only reason to contact the police is to get a crime reference number for insurance purposes.

They won’t come out to give your car the once-over when some scumbag has smashed the window and nicked your sat nav.

Someone has said some bad words on the internet – let them feel the full force of the law instead.

Unless someone is caught in the act of committing crimes against property, they aren’t really crimes anymore.

It’s free reign for the thieves.

I appreciate there are procedures and the police need to find out what has happened.

But this could be done by investigating and then taking the necessary steps.

I’m sure the average 78-year-old man isn’t going to be doing a midnight flit to Brazil.

Do the police now serve law-abiding citizens or lawbreakers? So much for an Englishman’s home being his castle!

PARENTS AND PUPILS ARE SICK OVER £1,400 US SCHOOL TRIP

It must have been a nightmare for the 48 pupils and three members of staff from Crookhorn College hospitalised with nausea, diarrhoea and vomiting while on a school trip to America.

It’s not like they’ve been sent on a trip to the local village to sketch the shops and can quickly get home for a change of pants.

Their parents must have been going out of their minds with worry with them all the way over there.

And it cost £1,400! That must be a sickener as well.

It does show, though, how things have moved on since I was at school.

It used to be a day out in Dorset looking at Coastal Erosion or Calshot Activity Centre if your parents had blagged the Provi for another loan.

FORGIVE ME IF I DON’T JOIN IN WITH THIS ANT & DEC FAWNING

After the very public ‘fall from grace’ of Ant McPartlin, attention soon turned to the other half of the duo – Dec – and how he’d do as a lone presenter.

I couldn’t quite believe some of the rubbish that was going around.

I even read someone said ‘When was the last time the United Kingdom was so united? We are all rooting for Declan Donnelly.’

Really? What drivel.

Who knew a TV presenter, paid millions of pounds, could actually read from an auto-cue and present a TV programme?

I’m in awe over it all.

Quick! Get him to the palace, fast-ball the man a knighthood. What he has done is unsurpassed.

It really was one of those ‘remember where you were moments.’