And the answer was already a clear yes. And nobody has argued any different.

I have no idea what you think links the possible murder of innocent people by police firearms and the possible use of lethal force against would be arsonists? I would have thought everybody's point of view was that a criminal, committing a crime which deliberately posed an unacceptable risk death to the victims of that crime could rightly meet police (and possibly public) resistance including lethal force. Im not sure why you think this context changes anything, it was the context I assumed everybody was operating under.

This seems a very long winded way of you saying that used that specific, rare and unlikely example because that specific, rare and unlikely example happened, but the fact it happened doesnt mean it is any less specific, rare or unlikely. Rare and unlikely things happen all the time, but we can pay them little heed to rare and unlikely things because they are rare and unlikely. And strangely that you think Her Majesties Inspectorate of Constabulary is posting on this thread.
The rules of engagement havent changed and dont need to change because there is already provision there, the police are aware of this, if they arent that is because they are incompetent. It is clear and it is regularly used.

If a police office made the decision that the rules of engagement didnt allow him to use any force to somebody who was posing a clear and immediate threat to life then that Police Officer made a mistake, they made an error and the use of the report and debate around what happened would be on that Police Officer's clear need for additional training, there doesnt need to be a change in law or tactics, simply making sure that officers are aware of them, something really which should be the very bare minimum for someone to be enforcing the law.

It seems odd that the police shot and killed a man causing the riots, then said they didnt think they could use lethal force.

Yes. In Syria they shoot you for protesting. This is about reserving the right to shoot people who are attempting to burn down residential property.

Already, if you take someone hostage with a gun EVEN IF ITS A REPLICA then you can be shot by the armed police. Does that make us a police state?

interesting comments from the Chief of the Met Police www.guardian.co.uk/uk/feedarticle/10010469 Quote Bernard Hogan-Howe acknowledged that police needed to review their tactics in the light of last summer's disturbances. However he said water cannon had limitations and were "not the answer" to the problems which confronted police last August.'" Quote After a review of police tactics by HM Chief Inspector of Constabulary Sir Denis O'Connor controversially suggested officers could shoot arsonists if they posed a threat to life, Mr Hogan-Howe said he did not believe arming riot police was an option. "I don't see foreseeably at the moment that is an option," he told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.'"

interesting comments from the Chief of the Met Police www.guardian.co.uk/uk/feedarticle/10010469 Quote Bernard Hogan-Howe acknowledged that police needed to review their tactics in the light of last summer's disturbances. However he said water cannon had limitations and were "not the answer" to the problems which confronted police last August.'" Quote After a review of police tactics by HM Chief Inspector of Constabulary Sir Denis O'Connor controversially suggested officers could shoot arsonists if they posed a threat to life, Mr Hogan-Howe said he did not believe arming riot police was an option. "I don't see foreseeably at the moment that is an option," he told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.'"

Its obviously what the Government advisers think is the way forward otherwise we wouldn't be having this debate.

Are you saying they are wrong and you are right?

I suspect that SmokeyTA is the alter ego of Damo, and would go a long way in explaining his convoluted outlook on life....

If you'd lear to use the quote facility properly, we might know what the hell you are on about

And you agree with every idea from every government because advisors will have been involved at some stage?

The use of baton rounds is something we have experience of using in the past so therefore you would hope that the decision has been made based upon that. Who knows.

I'm looking forward to watching the news and seeing some chav smashed to the ground having been hit by one.

Regardless of whether said chav has actually committed a crime?

And because of this experience we know how indiscriminate and inaccurate they are, when you are close enough for them to retain some accuracy they can be a lethal round so you may as well use standard ammunition and just kill people.

Maybe if the scum weren't rioting burning building's and people's homes down then the subject of Baton rounds wouldn't come into the equation. The police should have used water cannons on them at the very least.

He's still a chav, would it be such a great loss really.

What difference would a baton round make to stopping someone burning a building down or rioting?
If the police are close enough to accurately fire baton rounds then they're close enough to arrest the arsonist/rioter.
Plus the debate was about whether use of baton rounds would have been a deterrent to and stopped the "Riots" earlier this year. Considering the vast majority of people on the streets at the time were not doing anything close to rioting or arson it seems a bit daft to restrict the scenarios to only those situations. As mentioned before the Police have authorisation and equipment already to stop those kind of things. Plus no amount of baton rounds or water cannon can stop a crime the police don't know is taking place or make up for a lack of police deployed to the streets.

I'd love to hear what what some posters would suggest is reasonable force a homeowner could use to stop someone setting fire to their home , containing their family ?

Lethal.

You'd have thought that after a couple of months it would have sunk through even the thickest scull, we didn't have water canon available to mainland forces at the time and even now they are only available at something like 24 hours notice.

The fact he suggestd their use would suggest he considers they should be available

The fact that they weren't available and have never been available kinda negates that.

Is that so? [urlhttp://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmhaff/1456/1456vw.pdf[/url

32. The senior police officers we spoke to made it clear that the power to use equipment
such as water cannon and baton rounds was available, but such equipment was not used
because it was not considered suitable in the type of situations that they encountered.

Yes, it was available, but they chose not to use it.

As for inflaming the situation, well they shouldn't have been rioting in the first place.

In words so simple even you can understand, the power to use something doesn't make it available for use, if you can show me where, on the mainland, water canon were based and able to be used you might have some argument.

This isn't about whether they were located in mainland britain, this is the fact that if the police had wanted to, they were available to have been sent across from Northern Ireland to be used. Therefore they were available to the police to get and use, or is that too simple for you to understand? The riots weren't just a one night showing.

"Hang on you rioting chaps, can you come back in 24-48 hours so we can sort out the water canon, see its in Northern Ireland at the moment and we need time to get them here"

Yup, I'm sure that would have worked...

funnily enough, the rioters did do that.

With 24 hours notice the old bill were able to put enough bodies on the ground that they could contain and end the riots, the reason the riots spread was it seemed like they'd lost control, it wasn't because they didn't have water canon or baton rounds to hand.

Whereupon all the other cities and towns suffered because their coppers were saving London

If they had had wc and br to hand then they might not have lost control in the first place