YET MORE CASH FOR MADELEINE McCANN.

The Metropolitan Police have already spent some £11.75m on their investigation, 'Operation Grange', into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, and have now asked for yet more cash; they say that they are pursuing "active lines of inquiries" which, they claim, "the public would expect us to see ... through".

Really ? This child went missing 12 years ago while in the supposed care of her parents and no trace of her has been found since. What "active lines of inquiries" the police are now pursuing hasn't been explained but one suspects that this is a smokescreen designed simply to justify the continued expenditure, rather than telling the family that there's nothing more to be done. One also wonders whether there will ever be a line drawn under this affair and the investigation formally closed.

Madeleine is almost certainly dead and it is highly unlikely that the truth of what happened to her will ever be revealed. It's been deemed inappropriate to lay any blame at the door of the parents who, at the very least, were guilty of neglecting their children while enjoying socialising with friends; whether their guilt extends any further, we will, in all probability, never know. Instead, a low key investigation continues, more because of a reluctance on the part of the authorities to admit that they've failed and that the investigation must end, than for any other reason.

Isn't it amazing that seemingly endless bundles of cash can be produced for something so fruitless, when more worthy causes go begging. As a member of the public, I see no purpose in continuing this pointless investigation and I wonder who are "the public" whom Cressida Dick believes want the waste of resources to be continued. Surely she has far more urgent and immediate matters on which to commit scarce resources than an incident which happened in a country many miles away, many years ago.

Postscript :
Very conveniently, just as the Metropolitan Police have requested £300.000 to allow them to continue investigating for another 12 months, there are reports of a new suspect for the presumed abduction. Apparently, some "foreign paedophile" is now in the frame although why it's taken 12 years to get to this 'discovery' is something of a mystery. It must also be highly unlikely that another year and more money will produce any result.

This is nothing but chucking good money after bad.