the Noble Interviews / "Sir" Norman Bettison
....you are clearly a man of principle.
We meet in a luxurious, oak lined office with an enormous desk and a view of the city behind. The handsome man striding purposefully across the lush carpet is the subject of my interview today. He shakes my hand firmly and offers me a seat in a sumptuous leather arm chair facing the enormous desk. He then sits down opposite me, behind his desk, tilts his gas lift executive chair back and places his feet, clad in immaculately polished black shoes, carefully on the broad desk. There is an air of quiet certainty, confidence, and authority about him.
DM: Hello Sir Norman. May I call you Norm?
NB: Of course, of course, my honour.
DM: Well Norm, you've had an illustrious career as a police officer...
NB: Indeed.
DM: ...and you've culminated that career with the high office of Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police, a force of some considerable renown.
NB: Yes, as a force we were instrumental in many high profile cases, including attacking miners and not catching the Yorkshire Ripper.
DM: But you were unable to achieve the pinnacle of Chief Con of the Met?
NB: No. Regrettably I was 'required to resign' by my Police Authority, a group of democratic amateurs, in 2012. They got it into their heads that, just because I was at the stadium, I was in some way responsible for the Hillsborough disaster.
DM: They seemed to be under the misapprehension that you were also engaged in the cover-up of police fuck ups?
NB: Self evident nonsense. If I was involved in a cover-up I would have to deny it wouldn't I. Wouldn't anybody?
DM: And you are still the subject of an Independent Police Complaints Commission investigation?
NB: Yes, but that doesn't affect my knighthood.
DM: Was this about your involvement in the theft of precious metals in 1987?
NB: Yes, among other things, but as I've said, it won't affect my knighthood. I mean, look at Jeffrey Archer for heaven's sake.
DM: You did however lose your Honorary Fellowship of Liverpool John Moores University. Did that come as a shock?
NB: Completely. It turned out they were just a bunch of left-wingers anyway.
DM: Interestingly, you were also involved in the Met's investigation of eighteen-year-old Stephen Lawrence who was murdered by racists in south London in 1993 whilst waiting for a bus. Was that not a bit off your beaten track?
NB: Well clandestine co-operation between the two forces goes back a long way, and the Met had some concerns about the character of Stephen Lawrence's family. I undertook some "extra curricular" investigation to show that the entire family were undependable and that the Met were strictly impartial and totally above board.
DM: Despite your best efforts, the Met have been made to look culpable?
NB: I'm afraid so. There is a dangerous movement afoot to make Chief Constables accountable to elected bodies and this has been infiltrated by communists and the taliban. I withdrew my candidacy for Met Chief Inspector in protest, saying, and I quote, "I am not prepared to set aside my professional judgement and integrity, forged over 36 years, in order to meet short-term political expediency".
DM: You are clearly a man of principle; a truly noble knight of the realm.
NB: I would have to agree.
See also.....
The Noble Interviews:
the noble Lords Browne and Howell
the noble Sir Andrew Witty (sic)
For more by Deacon Martin:
© 2013 Deacon Martin
