There are so few police!

[graffitiwall]

Just watched some videos of the riots on at the moment - really struck by how there is literally just a thin line of police against a mass mob of adrenaline fuelled men looking for aggro.

It must be terrifying for them!

Just want to give a big up to the police women and men at this time trying to hold that line.

I was thinking more of the immediate situation tbh. Those thugs were clearly trying to goad the police into a violent response so a fight could kick off. Tasering would have been the flame to the fire. Or at least, I’m guessing that’s why the police were responding as they did in the footage I saw.

Have just seen the list of riots for tomorrow night....smaller towns. Less police to police as they are deployed to the cities

My town is in the list I'm fuming!

Where's this list?

@imfae I would like to give a very un mumsnetty hug to all those affected

Good post, but why the need for this comment. Aren’t you here doing exactly what you are objecting to in the rest of your post?

People on mumsnet are all individuals. And many of those individuals give their time posting on MN to really help, support, advise and show compassion and caring to other women, some of whom are in terrible circumstances. I’ve been moved to tears on a few occasions by the sheer attunement some posters have shown to other women going through terrible experiences. I’ve learnt a lot from some of the wise women on here.

Yes there are some real arseholes on here, but why tar a whole group of people just because of a few arseholes? Isn’t that the behaviour you are objecting to in your post?

This lazy narrative that it’s ‘unmumsnetty’ to ‘give hugs’ really bothers me. It’s absolutely not my experience of Mumsnet and I can’t help thinking that there are undertones of misogyny in wanting to label a site for women supporting women as a bunch of callous, uncaring b**ches ( which I think is implied in your comment). When actually the women here are diverse ( and you seem to support diversity) and an awful lot of them are absolutely brilliant. Why ignore that in spreading a lazy narrative that a predominantly women’s sure doesn’t do compassion?

(I also think it’s a bit off to parade yourself as caring unlike all those ‘Mumsnetty’ other women).

Can you blame people for not wanting to be a Police Officers.

They are treated like shit. The Public hate them. They get paid a shit wage.
They are constantly watched and hounded. One Officer does something wrong and they are all tarred with the same brush. They are always used as scapegoats. They are constantly called sexist, racists, homophobic etc.

They have no where near the amount of staff to cover shifts. My DH has to somehow fill 6 shifts next weekend Friday to Sunday where there is no Sergeant on to run teams because so many are off sick with injury or stress. He will have to cancel RDs for 6 people over a weekend that they would have plans. They only get 2 weekends off a month, and now it will be just one.

People have no idea how shit it is for Officers.

@Longcommute

It's circulating on tik tok

And no doubt it'll be his fault for not clearing the queues quickly enough.
senior leaders should be getting out there and leading from the front, not hiding in their cosy offices criticising the front line. And not for 1 shift where they are crewed with a PC to pick up the paperwork and show them what to do. Out of the office for several sets of shifts in a row in their uniform, single crewed responding to domestics etc in the same way they expect their officers with less than two years service to do. Picking up paperwork and then being told that nobody is allowed to go home until further notice because there's too much work that urgently needs covering and not enough officers. Shift after shift after shift.

100%

I'm not a Police officer but do work closely with some Police officers who are wonderful people who tell me about, like most public sectors, their sectors have been decimated by funding cuts, social decline and an a seemingly increasing social attitude where Police officers are treated as fair game for any abuse and violence as deserving it.

And officers who have been around long enough to see that Policing has changed so much that they are sat in offices most of the time dealing with paperwork and that their day to day Policing has moved away from what they wanted out of their careers - i.e serving the communities tackling crime, to the majority of their time being taken up with 'social issues'; anti-social behaviour, drug use, homelessness, domestic violence, mental health issues, emotional dysregulation etc.

And now, the ethos (from my understanding) is that if you don't have a degree as a Police officer, you need to be willing to study for one on the job, which excludes applicants who don't want to do that.

All the time, having some members of the public goad and film them to put on Tiktok while not being paid all that much.

It's very telling that MN which is usually very anti-Police, has a few people supporting the Police in the recent riots. Because when the shit hits the fan, people realise we need them.

And of course, it goes without saying there are some asshole Police officers and some criminal Police officers, but that's an invalid reason for the hate and disrespect the profession is subject to.

DH says there is absolutely no way he would join up now. He’s done many years on the ‘frontline’ and now, mildly broken after a decade of those fucking awful 6-4 shifts, he’s in more of a desk job and a bit more senior. If he was still a response PC he says he’d have quit long ago, and this is from someone who actively enjoyed being a response officer. We’re now too far in with the years and the pension for him to leave, we’d lose so much money.

The state of the police in the UK is beyond embarrassing.

In my opinion it started when they brought in PCCs. CCs are now accountable to a policitian whose main interest in life is getting re-elected to stay on thr gravy train. All the time that PCCs have the hiring and firing power, the chief Constable will always do what the PCC wants. The PCC does whatever they think will get them most votes or whatever their personal pet project is. Hence the wholesale politicisation of the police who are meant to be impartial upholders of the law.
police authorities were a much better system, holding the chief accountable but without one person having absolute power over them.

plus endless failed, pointless "initiatives" incepted by officers seeking evidence for their next promotion panel which are abandoned as soon as the officer moves onwards and upwards

This is a really interesting post.

My DH has had to send over 40 Officers down to a major city this morning. He had to ask almost 70 people but lots were refusing to go. The Police are not allowed to strike and this is almost that.... So many are not wanting to go down and get the shit kicked in to them.

Are officers allowed to refuse?

No.... it is quite worrying that so many have said no and have come up with lots of excuses as to why...

This is the next problem

I don’t blame them

My sister is the same. All her leave has been cancelled. She's just left for work now after two hours sleep following yesterday's 16hr shift. No end in sight either. Totally thankless. Some people's perception of the police is just so wrong.

Nope. If it's a lawful order from a superior officer you do it or face disciplinary action.

rank structure and discipline is like the army.

the fed have recently been discussing lobbying for industrial rights but no government in their right mind will do that.

what you have to understand is that police officers are not employees, they hold the office of constable in the name of the King. This means they are not subject to employment law like ordinary citizens or the working time directive.

my Dh was a fed rep and with 44 years service between us it amazes me anyone still joins up. The Job is fucked.

And if she was a professional driver that would never be allowed.

you can bet your bottom dollar if anything goes wrong she'll get the blame for it regardless of how many hours she's worked or what pressure she was under. Because nobody hates the police more than their masters.

It starts with a culture where recruits aren't used to an environment where you have to follow orders and they question the judgement of senior, more experienced officers and think they know it all. It ends up with a situation where a generation that aren't used to putting up and shutting up refuse orders.

where we are now is a very dangerous situation to be in, the government wanted to "professionalise" police officers and make everyone have degrees blah blah blah. The ex forces guys that formed the backbone of uk policing were too white, too male and not progressive enough for senior leaders wanting to show off their right-on credentials. So we stopped recruiting them because they weren't what were wanted.

the elephant in the room of course is that the police sometimes need to be enforcers not just friendly, tree hugging quasi social workers and you need officers that want to get hands on, use force and take control of the situation. nobody of any policital hue wants to acknowledge that.