I think the problem is that the police have evolved - they've evolved into the coppers that those who make laws (giovernment, last time I checked) insisted on passing - the police don't write the laws, they enforce them... so don't balme the cops if they are now far less effective than they used to be. You could even argue that it's all our own fualt for voting in the folk who made the changes.
The divide and conquer operation is running very well in the Uk - having lost a shedload of money in the banking crisis, backed up by lending money to foreign halfwits (I flowered it up a bit there, did you notice?) we ended up deep in the financial poo - government can't cut pay and conditions for private companies, but they can do so for public servants, so they did. Who's getting shafted next then? Which set of public servants is going to be demonised next week I wonder.