phone this number if ..........

there seems to be a bit of an epidemic here in britain with adverts asking joe public to phone and report a wrong doing.

these include terroism, truancy ,benefits fraud ,pubs that stay open late ,handling stolen goods - to name a few.

is this because the people that are paid to catch these people are being made redundant or is this really an effective way of catching people.if this continues will we all become nosey , busy bodies looking out of our windows 24-7 trying to catch people breaking the law.perhaps next they will offer rewards to those that phone in.

any thoughts and is this common place elsewhere in the world.

we already have an abundance of nosey busy bodies at the moment