Page 3 - Bedfed Sept2016 Flipbook

Chair’s introduction
Contents
Chair’s introduction
Brave duo’s day in the spotlight
you lost a hero, i lost my dad one per cent pay rise
Force slightly below national average on fitness tests
Taser - Fed concern over low sign-up
Tribute to John
Crime up, officer numbers down
Surgery dates
23,000 officers assaulted in last year
Federation supports Cadet camp
Kate tackles PM on widows pensions
Mind leading the way with Blue Light Programme
‘you are never alone’
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Cover photo: Our brave officers outside No 10 Downing Street.
Photo courtesy of Anderson Photography.
CoNTaCT yoUR FEdERaTioN
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Email: Bedfordshire@polfed.org Web: www.beds.polfed.org
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We welcome new officers but we still need more
By Jim Mallen Chairman of Bedfordshire Police Federation
The current Force
recruitment drive has
seen 40 new recruits
starting out as
student officers since
June this year. of
course, we welcome this news and congratulate these new officers. They have taken a brave step in joining the police service at this time driven by a desire, like the rest of us, to serve their communities, fighting and preventing crime, protecting the vulnerable and keeping the peace.
But these new officers still only take our establishment up to just under 1,100 officers, compared with our pre-austerity figure of 1,250 and yet there really has been no corresponding decline in demand to match this reduction in feet on the beat.
In fact, the complete opposite is true. The police service always seems to be everyone’s first, and last, port of call. We are called to all sorts of non-policing matters – you only have to listen to some of the bizarre calls made into our control rooms to understand that – and we also get summonsed when no-one else will help. We are expected to be, among many other things, marriage guidance counsellors, mental health specialists, social workers, dispute resolution experts and that’s before we start crime- fighting.
On the whole, we are happy to help, we do our best to be all things to all people but, when there are only so many of you to go around, it does become more difficult to juggle it all and there is often a price to pay.
At the Police Federation conference in 2015 Theresa May, in her former role as Home Secretary, accused the Police Federation of ‘crying wolf’ over the cuts saying it had spent years ‘scaremongering’ when it said crime rates would rise as a result of the Government’s cuts programme.
Mrs May said: “The last five years have shown that it is possible to do more with less – crime has fallen, the front-line service has been maintained and public confidence in the police is up, even as spending has reduced.”
She continued: “I know there are those who say there is no more waste to cut. But I simply do not accept that. It is perfectly
possible to make savings without affecting the quality of neighbourhood policing.”
But, the latest crime statistics seem to fly in the face of these claims, and would appear to prove that there was a wolf stalking after all. Two reports released earlier in the summer show that crime is up, with cyber-crime a new and emerging avenue for criminals being included in the figures for the first time, and also show a decline in police numbers. Is there really no link between these two facts?
But while it would be easy to gloat and say, ‘we told you so’, I think we also need to consider some other factors not shown in these reports. Crime really is only part of the story with policing. There are, as I outlined above, so many other incidents that we get called to and this has also increased as others – the ambulance service and mental health support workers being two prime examples – find themselves suffering the effects of cuts. They may have to say ‘no’, but are the service that never says ‘no’.
This sadly has an effect on the greatest asset of any police force – its people; the hard working police officers, police support staff and police volunteers. More and more of them are feeling the physical effects of working in modern day policing, with assaults on police personnel increasing – particularly now we are adopting a more consistent way of recording these. But an increasing number are also feeling the mental effects of trying to maintain a quality policing service for the communities we serve.
Of course, in November, the then Chancellor announced there would be no further cuts to policing in this Parliament, a move welcomed by everyone involved in policing, and there have been moves to train more AFOs, with the Government seemingly recognising that given the current terrorism threat we need to be better prepared in this area.
But what we really need is more investment in policing. We need our numbers to be returned to 2009 levels, at least. We have a new Government, with Mrs May at the helm, Amber Rudd now in charge at the Home Office and Brandon Lewis as policing minister. Let’s hope this signals a change in direction, an acknowledgement that enough is enough, that cuts do have consequences and the Police Federation really does know what’s best for policing.
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