MANY years ago, from the top deck of an “O” bus, which ran on Teesside’s busiest bus route, linking Middlesbrough and Stockton at roughly ten-minute intervals, an amazing night-time sight could be seen.

At frequent stops along Middlesbrough’s busy Newport Road passengers could gaze straight into the bars of a seemingly endless succession of Victorian pubs. Their air thick with tobacco smoke, each was crammed with drinkers – mostly steelworkers from the then still active Ironmasters’ District close by.

The next morning, one or two – but only one or two – would be sure to appear in the magistrates’ court charged with being drunk and disorderly. In the old phrase, they had had one too many. Usually, they were punished with a 40s (£2) fine, before they shuffled off, generally contrite and shamefaced.

Today’s equivalent of that Newport’s publand is the club scene, not just in Middlesbrough, but every town. Its drinkers are predominately young people, female as well as male. And, unlike those hard-drinking steelmen, many aim to get drunk. To give themselves a head start they even have “predrinks”.

The upshot is that in place of the simple drunks of long ago we now have binge-drinkers, a national disgrace.

But not to be frowned upon. Oh dear me, no. Middlesbrough now has its Boro Angels, doling out sympathy and a little more to those who have drunk themselves helpless.

They will give them lollipops, wrap them in warm blankets, treat minor injuries, provide them with safer footwear, even help summon a taxi.

The police back this benign approach.

Where, in the old days, a superintendent would have boomed sternly about not tolerating disorderly conduct, a sergeant from the “community safety team” now speaks gently of “assisting individuals who may have had a little too much to drink”. Is he not aware that that was most probably their intention?

Of course, there is a national need to create more responsible attitudes to drink. Extending opening hours was meant to work that miracle, but, as foreseen by many, it has had the opposite effect.

So the binge-drinkers have to be dealt with.

What better than the traditional treatment – bundled into a police van, an uncomfortable night in a police cell, and a final sobering-up before the beak first thing next morning?

Few are likely to want to repeat the experience.

Any drunk from the old days who was offered a lollipop and a taxi home would have taken it as confirmation that, yes, he was well and truly plastered.

STILL on law and order (there’s never any shortage of material, is there?), some editions of The Northern Echo on Monday brought a telling juxtaposition of items. A story told of persistent anti-social behaviour at Thirsk, where youths gather in a church porch and light fires and drink. People fear the church could be burned down.

Unrelated, but directly below this report, was a letter from Councillor Carl Les, of the North Yorkshire Police Authority. It began: “North Yorkshire Police Authority’s role is to maintain an efficient and effective police service throughout the county and City of York.”

From its apparent impotence to stop dangerous misbehaviour at Thirsk church, which is just a short, brisk walk from the police station – still less in a patrol car – it obviously has its work cut out to fulfil that role.