'The initiative, which is part of a new Home Office drive to make police forces more responsive and accountable, is meant to help people who might not be certain how to report minor crimes.
Its introduction follows the failure of the new non-emergency number 101, which was introduced in 2005 to ease pressure on the 999 system but abandoned two years later.'
Text 66101 for police instead of calling 999 - Telegraph
I fail to understand how if Joe Bloggs didn't grasp the telephone number to ring for 'minor crimes', and that that initiative failed, how the introduction of a similar text scheme will be more successful.
I can certainly think of more important ways the police could have perhaps used the £3.5 million poind budget the scheme's cost.