My son - aged 31, six foot three inches tall and a gentle family man with a wife and three-year-old son - was walking home on his own recently from a friend's house in Gypsy Hill in the London borough of Lambeth, when he was confronted by three people wearing masks who demanded his phone, iPod and wallet.

He handed over what he had and was then viciously punched to the ground for no reason.

What sort of society is this where the local councils and central Government are more concerned with parking restrictions, speeding fines and recycling than the safety of the individual?

The same people who strive to abide by all the petty rules and regulations are very often the ones who get hurt, and seem to be the last ones anyone is interested in protecting.

Surely our priority should be to make the outside world safer, rather than have to retreat behind locked doors.

We constantly make excuses for unacceptable behaviour in this politically correct' society, citing bad upbringing, discrimination and poverty but this does not help those who are the victims.

It is time that something radical is done to protect us and to start building a safer world for future generations.

What is the use of having police who only come out on the streets (in a car) after a crime has been committed, to visit the victim and issue a crime number?

Why are we not insisting that they patrol the streets all of the time?

Mrs A Shippey, Ivy Road, Brockley