Rangers Fans Working Group meets with FoCUS and ACC Corrigan

[Bluedell 5,356]

Representatives of the Rangers Fans Working Group met yesterday with

Campbell Corrigan, the Assistant Chief Constable, plus a couple of his

colleagues as well as David Brand and Dougie Stevenson from the FoCUS unit.

 

The meeting, which lasted for 2 hours, involved some frank and open

discussions regarding what FoCUS is trying to do, what the Police in general

are trying to achieve with football fans, and potential areas to look out

for to ensure our fans are not in danger of arrest and prosecution under the

new law.

The main points of the meeting were as follows;

 

The police continue to refuse to produce a list of banned songs, but during

training and meetings with forces around the country, they advise the home

match commander and police on duty what songs to be aware of.

 

FoCUS go to games through a mixture of them choosing matches after viewing

the fixture list, and by being invited by the match commander. This will

normally be intelligence led.

 

There are 15 Full time FoCUS officers and can cover 6 matches at the same

time. They hope to be at 6 matches on January 2.

 

For the first half of the season, there was a lot of filming using the hand

held cameras to gather evidence of good and bad behaviour at football

matches. As this part of the work has been completed, cameras are now only

deployed to a particular incident during a match.

 

Footage obtained through FoCUS cameras are held for 30 days and then deleted

unless there are reasons to retain it, for example where offences have been

committed.

 

When asked if FoCUS would publicise a list of matches attended on their

website, we were told they had not thought about it but would look into it

for the end of the season. They were keen to declare that they are not

solely interested in Rangers and Celtic games, and that the most problematic

areas trhey have encountered have been, amongst others, the Ross County v

Partick Thistle match, with a group of Dundee casuals, a group of young Ayr

fans, and even at a junior match in Ayrshire.

 

The police are happy to keep in constant contact with fans groups to discuss

and advise on offensive songs. They stated they were happy with our

previously published list of songs and chants we have previously advised

Rangers fans to steer clear of.

 

FoCUS have now ordered new bibs saying FoCUS rather than the current

anti-sectarian police unit.

 

The police will discuss fixtures for 2012-13 with the SPL before they are

finalised this summer. They will again push for 1 midweek OF fixture and

they were disappointed that they only midweek fixture offered by SPL was the

December one.

 

There were 12 arrests at the recent OF game, of which only 1 was for

Sectarian Breach of the Peace. There were only 2 arrests at the recent St

Mirren match, 1 for a smoke canister and 1 for being drunk. These are fairly

typical figures for Rangers matches.

 

Police were happy with current trends of policing at football, with police

numbers at football down 30% in the last 2 years, which they hope continues

in the future.

 

CC stated that he advised the Celtic trust that up the ra would lead to

arrests and prosecution in answer to a direct question about it, and that it

was not an exclusive list.

 

The police are looking to develop links with fans groups to assist in the

training of officers, and to observe such training when it occurs.

 

There was 120 litres of alcohol seized by police during bus checks at OF

game. More info to follow on this.