Since I first heard about the idea of a privately-funded security firm patrolling Bedford’s public spaces, I felt uneasy. And I’ve been trying to put that discomfort into words.
I’ve asked around, men and women from across the UK, of different ages and political persuasions. One man from Manchester remarked drily, ‘that’s just what we need, more men marauding the streets’.
Several women told me the very idea made them feel ‘incredibly unsafe’. Overall, the reaction I got was unanimous: people were appalled and instinctively rejected the very idea of the scheme.
Granted, I’ve not conducted a properly sampled, representative academic study, but then neither has Peter McCormack.
Because, scratch beneath the surface and the dangers of this arrangement become clear.
What we are witnessing is not policing by consent, which is the hard-won principle that officers serve the public with legitimacy because they are accountable to the communities they protect.
Policing by ideology
Instead, it is policing by ideology, with no robust system to collect monitoring data, no independent evaluation, and no clear lines of accountability.
When corporations employ private security for private spaces or events, there are at least some constraints: corporate liability, shareholder oversight, and reputational risks.
Safeguards exist. When security guards answer – ultimately – to a single individual, none of that applies. Instead, what I see in McCormack’s initiative is public safety staged as political theatre.
For commentators and influencers, security teams aren’t just about deterrence; they’re also content.
A scuffle outside a supermarket, an eviction of a rough sleeper, a log of anti-social incidents; these moments are broadcast online as proof of decisive action, evidence that someone is ‘doing something’ about urban decline.
Vulnerable people risk becoming stage props in a political performance, their lives instrumentalised for clicks and notoriety.
The political nature of this ‘security’ is laid bare in the most recently published incident log.
Across multiple entries, suspects are described only by gender, except in one case, where a suspected drug dealer is specifically identified as an ‘IC3 male’, a term used as police shorthand for a Black man.
Out of all the incidents of suspected drug-dealing recorded, only a Black suspect is racially identified. What safeguards exist to prevent bias and ideological enforcement? If we cannot assume impartiality, we must assume bias.
Corporations could and should be investing in prevention and staff support to combat retail theft. Yet, pushing desperate people away from shoplifting does not address the underlying need.
I wonder, if a desperate addict cannot steal from a store, are they then more likely to turn to breaking and entering, or even mugging? The initial problem risks being potentially transformed into a more dangerous one.
Likewise, dispersing public drinkers from one contained area of the town does not eradicate the problem; it simply diffuses it. Day drinkers don’t disappear. I’ve already witnessed their scatter into pockets of green space in suburban streets and small neighbourhood playgrounds.
Problems moved elsewhere
Outreach workers, who once knew where to find people to offer help, can’t reach them. Evidence shows that forced removals and dispersals reduce access to services and worsen health and safety outcomes for people experiencing homelessness.
Studies consistently show that women experiencing homelessness are more likely to be victims of sexual violence.
When private guards clear rough sleepers or addicts from city centres, vulnerable women are displaced to more hidden spaces, cut off from outreach services. Women at the margins face heightened exposure to violence.
I can forward the relevant peer-reviewed academic literature to anyone interested.
Even regulated police forces with democratic oversight have repeatedly failed women. In England and Wales, there have been numerous cases in recent years of serving officers and staff convicted of crimes, including serious sexual offences.
High-profile cases, from Wayne Couzens’ abduction and murder of Sarah Everard to multiple prosecutions for sexual assault by serving officers, have shattered women’s trust.
Such abuses of power often occur within institutions that have internal affairs units, misconduct hearings, and parliamentary scrutiny. Uniforms project authority, but without clear safeguards, they also project threat.
For many women, the presence of men with unchecked power creates the opposite of reassurance.
Good people with good intentions
I want to be clear: I am not accusing McCormack or the security personnel he employs of any misconduct. I have no reason to doubt that these teams are made up of good people with good intentions.
My concern is not with their personal character, but with the system itself and the lack of robust oversight, transparency, and democratic accountability.
To those who have complained about ‘two-tier policing’, I ask: what logical conclusion might there be for neighbourhood security firms roaming the streets as an addendum – or even alternative – to the police?
This is not equality of enforcement. It is the fragmentation of civic order into rival, unaccountable forces.
McCormack has recently admitted on Facebook that he will not bankroll this indefinitely. His stated hope is that others will fund continued private patrols.
I find this chilling because the logical endpoint is not one group of guards but multiple private security factions operating openly in our public spaces. Elsewhere in the world, I’ve heard such groups referred to as militias, and in more extreme cases, their leaders are known as warlords.
Perhaps, the greatest danger of all is the precedent this sets for civic life. Public space is meant to belong to everyone. If wealthy individuals can deploy private teams to control who belongs and who doesn’t, that principle erodes.
Streets risk being carved into privately policed fiefdoms, each reflecting the ideology of whoever pays the wages.
The end result is not order but fragmentation: distrust between communities, invisible displacement of vulnerable people, and a creeping normalisation of coercion without consent.
If we are serious about safety, the answer is found not in performative crackdowns but in prosaic investment in root causes: housing, addiction services, mental health care, because security without consent is not security at all.
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Bedford
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