Police are under strain – but what could we stop doing?

WHAT could we stop police officers doing?

That’s the question posed by Jim Gray, Chairman of Northumbria Police Federation, in response to the HM Inspectorate of Constabulary Annual Report – which warned that the “unacceptable strain” on policing in England and Wales should “disturb everyone”.

Jim said: “We’ve got to ask hard questions around what it is to be a police officer.

“What do we want from our police service? Because we can’t keep demanding more from what seems to be an ever diminishing group of people.

“It’s difficult to see a situation where you would stop police officers doing any of what they currently do. Safeguarding work and dealing with vulnerability has seen huge growth, and rightly so, in terms of how we proactively manage and prevent harm to the most vulnerable in society.

“However, my perception is that the police are leading the way on this, but is that right that that should be the case? Are our partner agencies also rising to the challenge? Are they fully involved in delivering that new approach? Are they taking as much responsibility as us in safeguarding?”

“We cannot realistically expect the police to meet every possible demand we might make of them,” so says Sir Thomas Winsor, HM Chief Inspector of Constabulary in the State of Policing: The Annual Assessment of Policing in England and Wales 2016.

Jim added: “I think what the police in this country do is probably well above and beyond what police services do in other countries.

“We’ve got to be properly resourced to do what we do. That’s the bottom line.

“We’ve got to be properly motivated to do what we do, and you’ve got to give some basic things to achieve that. You’ve got to pay people an appropriate wage, you’ve got to support them in an appropriate way, you’ve got to create the framework where if an officer’s assaulted in the course of their duty the appropriate measures are taken against the perpetrator and also appropriate support is given to that officer.”

Steve White, Chair of the Police Federation of England and Wales, said: “This report echoes what we have been saying for too long now: something needs to change.

“Our calls, that demand on our already thin blue line are too great, have always been based on what we’ve been told directly by our members. Those are the facts they’ve told us – and today’s report provides further evidence that could be needed to support those.”