Special Patrol Group

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Note: the London Metropolitan Police unit should not be confused with the contemporary Special Patrol Group unit of the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

The Special Patrol Group (SPG) was a controversial unit of the London Metropolitan Police.

[edit] History

The SPG was formed in 1961 to provide a centrally-based mobile squad for combatting particularly serious crime and other problems which could not be dealt with by local divisions.

The convenient presence of a disciplined, well-organised team brought the group into increased use for the control of protests and demonstrations, where their presence sometimes came to assume unwanted symbolic significance.

Their most controversial incident came in 1979 when they attended a protest by the Anti-Nazi League in Southall, London, and, during a running battle, demonstrator Blair Peach was allegedly beaten to death. In the inquiries which followed, various weaponry was found in the possession of SPG officers, including baseball bats, crowbars and sledgehammers. No SPG officer was ever charged with the attack, although later, an internal report was leaked which stated that the Metropolitan Police paid an out of court settlement to Peach's family. The SPG was also cited as a major factor in the 1981 Brixton riots.

The SPG was disbanded in 1986, with the role of mobile support and public order unit being taken over by the newly formed Territorial Support Group (TSG).

[edit] In popular culture

The SPG are caricatured in Michael de Larrabeiti's Borrible Trilogy novels as the SBG, the Special Borrible Group, who are charged with destroying the way of life of those who will not conform to society's norms.

The SPG was a frequent butt of jokes on Not the Nine O'Clock News including a sketch where Rowan Atkinson criticises a racist police officer with the conclusion 'There's no room for men like you in my force, Savage. I'm transferring you to the SPG'.

In 1982, a destructive hamster was named "Special Patrol Group" by its owner, the punk character Vyvyan in the BBC sitcom The Young Ones.

Punk band The Exploited wrote the song 'S.P.G' in response to the acts of the group at the time, and also in reference to an incident in which singer and author of the song Wattie Buchan was allegedly arrested by the SPG for violence at a demonstration. This incident is widely believed among the punk community to be untrue, as the SPG was unique of the Met Police and Wattie spent most of his life at the time in Scotland, although it is possible he travelled to London for said demonstration. The song can be found on the 1981 album Punk's Not Dead.

[edit] Other uses

• The Special Patrol is also mentioned in the poem Five Nights of Bleeding, by Linton Kwesi Johnson, in which he states that they "will fall".

• Mentioned in The Oppressed song "Work Together"

"Dreaming of how life could be, If society was free, If We never had no SPG, It's up to you, it's up to me, to me"

• The Special Patrol Group is a famous band around the beautiful location of Tasmania Australia. Its members consist Of Rory Hardwood, Kim Walls, Magnus Hine, Michael Collins And Ellis Davis-Pitt.