This is another one of those stories that ought to be shocking but is unlikely to move the dial.<p>While the UK police are generally not that corrupt, Special Branch enjoy secrecy and closeness to power, which they interpret as a license to commit crimes against leftwing groups they consider anti-government. There's a long history of this from complicity in murders in Northern Ireland to present day highly intrusive surveillance against demonstrators.<p>> Evidence given to Parliament suggested that one undercover officer who infiltrated Mr Smith's union was Mark "Cassidy" Jenner, a member of Scotland Yard's now disbanded Special Demonstration Squad (SDS).<p>That's the Mark Jenner who also spent years having a relationship with the environmental activists he was spying on, the subject of a separate set of court cases and inquiries.<p>See also Hillsborough and the Miner's Strike.<p>(Oh, and disrupting the possibility of effective union action has been a priority of the government since the days of Thatcher)