Quality Street Gang

The Quality Street Gang was a name given to a group of criminals operating in Manchester in the 1960s and 1970s. Although the group was considered by some senior officers in the Greater Manchester Police to be the instigators of much of Manchester's major crime, many others believed that the gang was nothing more than a social friendship between a group of men, most of whom had criminal records. Certainly in the 20 years that the group was supposedly organising the city's crime, none of its alleged members was ever convicted of serious crimes.

The Quality Street Gang was reportedly named after an advertisement for Quality Street confectionery which featured a group of fashionably dressed people: as the "gang" walked into a pub, a wag supposedly shouted "It's the Quality Street Gang" and the name stuck. Another story says the name came about because most of the gang members were overweight. The gang was also at one point attached to a story about the Kray twins coming to Manchester to expand their turf, but being turned around at Manchester Piccadilly and put back on the train to London. In 2008 Daniel Flood gave evidence in a High Court hearing that his father Douglas Firkin-Flood had been a member of the gang who had been involved in the fight, although the claim was later denied by Flood's son Ian, who pointed out that several conflicting versions of the story exist. On his website, the former gangster Frankie Fraser doubts that the incident ever happened, as the Krays travelled exclusively by car and were uninterested in expanding their territory outside London.

In 1986, John Stalker, Deputy Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police, was suspended over accusations that, among other things, he had attended social events at which members of the gang were present. Stalker was later cleared.

The Quality Street Gang are the subject of the Thin Lizzy song The Boys Are Back In Town, as specified by the liner notes.