I would like to tell you a story. This happened to someone who does not want to be named.

It happened during the week after Christmas 2016 but before New Year, when many businesses and services are closed or working with minimum staff.

A friend of mine was driving and waiting in the middle of three lanes of traffic when a car drove past, scraping the side of his car from front to back.  The moving car did not stop, drove through the red traffic lights and away before anyone could get the registration number.

Later that day my friend phoned 101 to report the accident and he was given a CAD (incident) number, but asked for no details.  He was told that he needed to phone his local police station.  He then contacted Lewisham police who advised that he needed to get in touch with the traffic police at Sidcup.  Lewisham Police told him to phone 101 again because they could not give him the number he needed. He did that, and then phoned the number he was given twice.  He spent some 20 minutes listening to how busy they were each time, before being cut off.  On the third occasion, at approximately 16:50, the recording just informed that they would be available during normal office hours. (Monday to Friday between 09:00 and 17:00).  We then got on line and I helped him to send an email using the contact page of the metropolitan police website. 

Having entered his post code, my friend was assured that the email would go to his local police station, but a day or so later he received a reply from Bexley police which informed that we had sent the mail to the wrong station, but the message gave no information about where the email should have been sent.

He phoned 101 again and was told that he should have been told to complete an online form 207 the first time he contacted them on the day of the incident.  There is extensive CCTV coverage of the area where this happened and the registration of the hit and run car should have been discoverable in this way, but a week or so later he received a letter informing that the police did not have the manpower to check the CCTV footage or follow up his enquiry. 

It is true that his car insurance provider has dealt with the practicalities but a crime was committed when this car drove through the red light.  Is it fair that the driver who caused the damage that wrote off my friend’s car should not be investigated?  Is running a red traffic light not an offence?

So he has to accept that the police have problems which allow them to ignore the service he pays for.  Would the council have accepted that he was justified if he decided not to pay his full council tax bill because he was not getting the service he pays for?  See Lewisham council’s policy for those who do not pay council tax.

The real question has to be; he reported a hit and run incident, and a driving offence, but the police did nothing about it; why is he being forced to pay council tax?

Maureen B