Police Shroud Waving

Shroud waving refers to the process whereby any public body facing cuts starts talking about all the people who will die if any cuts are made. So for example if a local council has it's government grant cut by 10% then they start issueing apocalyptic warnings about how this will mean that the elderly will thrown onto the streets and will die, instead of maybe cutting the "Children's Play Awareness Officers".

The head of ACPO, the Chief Constables' lobby group, is trying a similar trick here:

Specialist police units dedicated to investigating crimes such as murder, rape or child abduction could be abolished because of the cutbacks in Whitehall, a senior officer warned yesterday.

Sir Hugh Orde, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) and a former chief constable of Northern Ireland, warned that teams dealing with one specific type of crime could be merged or scrapped as officers were moved elsewhere.

Really, so the only areas where the police could possible make cutbacks or efficiency savings are in things like murder and child rape?