Water under the bridge

I had a dejected phone call this afternoon from my daughter who had got back to Oxford station to find that her bike was no longer where she’d locked it up this morning. (I was once told that September is the bike-stealing month in Oxford and Cambridge. They are all transported to the other city then sold in October to the arriving students.)

She knows that this is not a tragedy: she’s had it far longer than the average Oxford bike lasts unstolen, she’s been relying on a feeble combination lock for far too long and although she recently paid to have a pedal replaced, the gears are shot. She’ll get over her attachment to a bike she’s had more than half her life as I got over my (grandmother’s) bike being stolen when I was about her age.

I met her walking back and went with her to the police station. Most of my experience with the police dates from when I was a student in (UK reference) the Life-on-Mars era. I was stopped every couple of months for being young, a cyclist or, when I was in my motorbike gear, a long-haired male. Shortly after that I worked with Afro-Caribbean youngsters in Brixton who were used to being stopped several times a day for being black and young.

Times change. I now belong to a more acceptable demographic, being a white female with grey hair who can use the ‘right’ accent, and black people are now ‘only’ three to four times more likely than white people to be stopped. (Be shocked – those are the current statistics in my part of the country.) Today I saw another change. Although I assume that bike theft belongs to the 60 per cent of crime that is not followed up, my daughter was taken seriously. She had to make her report by phone so initially they did not know her race. She was asked whether the theft made her feel less safe. An important question. She was also asked whether she knew of any reason why her bike might have been taken; whether there was anyone who might want to do this to her. An even more important question. I had no idea that the police were checking on hate crime through bicycle thefts. I approve.

I took some pictures that were relevant to the text but I messed up the camera settings and they were all blurred.