Editorial: Three in one

I welcome the crackdown which the police and Guardia Civil will be launching in Magalluf this summer following a meeting in Palma earlier this week, presided over by the Government Delegate, Teresa Palmer. The police will be aiming to try and outlaw the thieves masquerading as prostitutes and also street vendors and there will even be new legislation to regulate the so-called “party boats.” But I was rather concerned about one sentence in the press release from the Government Delegate´s Office which was sent to the media following the meeting. It stated “the Municipal Police and Guardia Civil will work closer  together and will share their information.”  Now I would have thought that the two law enforcement agencies in Calvia would be already sharing their information and working as one. Of course, they should have access to each other´s data base. Now, I know that the Guardia Civil and the Local Police have limited resources and they have an enormous workload but really you would expect that co-operation between the two forces would not even be an issue.  This state of affairs just adds weight to the argument which says that Spain should just have a single police force, not the three which exist at the moment. There is the National Police responsible for urban areas, the Guardia Civil who are charged with rural areas and many of the tourist resorts and then there is the Local Police force supporting the two. Perhaps, three in one would be a better idea.