How significant is this report that claims the public feels police officers are "more interested in being woke than solving crimes"?

[JellySaurus]

Home Secretary should reform failing police forces - think tank https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-627323366^

Very pleased to see this statement, and the BBC reporting it, but is it going to make a difference?

And the non crime hate incidents?

Nobody thinks the police are "too woke" because they are spending more time sorting out DV and missing children cases

But this is why we have no resources - not because we are too involved in 'woke' things

The public often have warped views on many things

This is just another example

I hope the police aren't forced to change because idiots can't understand the basics of their job

If a cop who has been directed to police an event decides to drop to one knee for a few seconds or has decided to wear a poppy - how does this effect solving of a crime?

It’s called democracy.

Because it shouldn’t be an individual decision to publicly support a political cause, some would say a divisive political cause. If you want to take the knee, do it in your off time.
As to the poppy, maybe the police should not wear anything attached to their uniform which is not part of it. No poppy ( although that is a signifier for a traditional National event) , no rainbow lanyard, no pride button. Just the uniform.

when I worked in an office, I would not have been allowed to wear a political badge if I was presenting to a client. I represented the company then, not my political affiliation or my sexual preference. The police should appear impartial. The behaviour you describe and advocate is not impartial.

Interesting to bring in the poppy. I thought it was the case that some forces were citing cuts as the reason why they would not attend remembrance events. Yet they happily adorn their cars with flags etc for Pride. That costs us - the taxpayer. And it's not an impartial act or one that's compatible with the Peelian principles.

Clearly there's a difference between the two and it's likely the former doesn't need the police there in the same way as for the latter but still. Let's not pretend that deciding to wear a poppy is the same as deciding to spend officer time and resources, going after people who tweet facts about human biology.

Here are the Peelian principles one of which directly clashed with being involved in politics.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/policing-by-consent/definition-of-policing-by-consent

1. To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion; but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour; and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.

That has nothing to do with my question!

Even more reason to stop investigating things that aren't crimes, then.

@ScreamingMeMe I think it takes up a lot of police time that would be best spent elsewhere. However I do think some online posts are wrong and I don't think we, as a society, have cracked how to regulate the online world yet.

Felix123 you obviously know a lot about policing.

People are baffled that police time is being spent on Tweets while they’re not investigating burglaries. And you’ve explained very well why the police are not investigating burglaries. But you haven’t explained why they are investigating Tweets when they are so poorly resourced. Could you explain that?

Is it just incompetent management that time is being spent on non crimes instead of crimes? Why can’t officers prioritise incidents of violence over Twitter? Do they have to do the first job they cone across like cab drivers or something?

www.theguardian.com/books/2013/apr/04/simon-armitage-black-roses-killing-sophie-lancaster

this is so nearby, they have learned NOTHING. They don't care about women and children. They never have.

Putting aside for a minute the issue of non crime hate incidents which is a serious issue as highlighted by the courts.

I think it's probable that major issues within the police are caused by underfunding, lack of resources etc. similar to the issues the NHS and other public services face.

What they do have right now is a PR problem and they need to understand that.

When Bob has his expensive bike which he uses to commute to work stolen from his garage and he can't get an officer round for weeks or even at all then tweets about flags, non binary hats, rainbow bumble bees, pup play and whatever else just add to Bob's sense of insult and injustice.

Now I accept in reality the two things may not be related but people are getting increasingly pissed off because the performative clowning around is not instilling confidence. Everyone knows the state of policing is in a bit of a mess for various reasons and it's all a prime example of rainbow washing.

Felix explained very very well why and how an entire shift of response cops can get depleted in minutes of duty time .

Now personally- as a police officer I don't agree with bowing and scraping, taking "the knee" etc . My friend runs the spoof website "bullshire police " and has a character satirising this called "pc Neil Neal " 😂.

However- government rules are that any hate incident must be logged for the home office counting rules .
This means that if a call handler says " and did that make you feel harassed alarmed or distressed "? Or even if someone is offended on someone else's behalf - including the call handlers!!!! It has to be recorded, documented and included in the home office stats .

And that's the reason non crime hate inc are recorded.
Same as non crime domestic incidents.

Blame the actual people who implement this rather than the cops on the ground having to deal with someone whose "offended " !

DarkDayforMN & ScreamingMeMe

Why we investigate tweets etc.

These jobs will be phoned or emailed in by member of the public as an incident which they want police involvement. they often think a crimes has been committed and will go along he lines of threatening behaviour etc but obviously can't put all the tweets on the police job over the phone.

So we have a reported incident that might be a crime - so a job gets created. If there are no immediate threat, harm or risk elements - it will drop onto the event queue and allocated to the next available cop

So a cop attends and speaks to the reporting person and will say "show me these tweets that have concerned you".

Now it could be that's is nothing more than a difference of opinion or an argument between both parties - in which case its gets written off as a non-crime incident.

However, it could be that there are offences there. There could be hundreds of tweets sent which may fall into an harassment or stalking crime, or there could be threats to kill or malicious communications - in which event these will be crimed and investigation started.

So, the non-crime related incident will not be investigated further where as the crime incident will be.

Either way, the police still have to attend initially to assess it either way.

Two people were arrested and made a full admission to the crime.

OvaHere
But the cop at the event can't attend your burglary job as he is directed to police that event only. If he decide to 'take a knee' which takes 3 seconds or so - how does this effect the time taken to attend that burglary by police?

Felix - you'll soon learn that you absolutely cannot win on these threads no matter how often you patiently explain the whys and wherefore.

I generally end up hiding these threads because you will never ever be able to say the right thing .

I think most people are aware that it's a policy issue and that individual police officers don't have a choice (although some of them seem to absolutely relish being petty authoritarians, like that PCSO who doorstepped the woman about a sticker on her own property).

Now I accept in reality the two things may not be related but people are getting increasingly pissed off because the performative clowning around is not instilling confidence. Everyone knows the state of policing is in a bit of a mess for various reasons and it's all a prime example of rainbow washing.

Exactly. It doesn't exactly instil respect either. Yes the police should be visible in communities and approachable, but recently some of them have been looking and acting like fucking clowns. And it looks very much like some demographics are being favoured.

So we have a reported incident that might be a crime - so a job gets created. If there are no immediate threat, harm or risk elements - it will drop onto the event queue and allocated to the next available cop

Fine, but the part I still don’t understand is that police forces have instigated policies of not investigating burglaries in order to reduce workload.

Why not institute a policy of not investigating hurt feelings on Twitter? And why continue to waste police time after it’s apparent there is no harm or risk involved? They don’t investigate actual death threats online or real life stalking. So why, in preference to actual crimes, are they wasting police time harassing people who think men can’t be women? At some point someone, even if it’s happening at the level of officers on the ground, is making the decision to prioritise bullshit over keeping the public safe.

government rules are that any hate incident must be logged for the home office counting rules

Again fine. But the Police Federation haven't been shy about saying things like Carnival should move (or be cancelled, ideally), and Chief Constables have been very quick to defend the Macarena and taking the knee. Somewhere we're all being let down here. Who's responsible? Chiefs or the government?

Yes I understand that. I don't think you read what I wrote properly. Also I wasn't the poster who mentioned taking a knee.

@Felix125 in the Sophie Lancaster case the Police had ignored the violent behaviour of gangs of youths in the park for months leading up to her murder. In this case, nearby, they again ignore gangs until many are attacked. They should patrol and put a stop to it earlier, learn from their horrendous mistakes.

@stillvicarinatutu and @Felix125

At the moment the respect and trust in the Police is going down the toilet faster than it ever has before. In fact, to a number of members of the public the Police are fast becoming a laughing stock or viewed with contempt.

Reasons are many and varied and I don't dispute that there are issues with resources, etc., but that is nothing new, policing duties have always had to be prioritised and people do understand that to a point, the issue is what you are prioritising.

The Police are supposed to serve all the public equally and without favour - everyone is equal under the Law. Why do the Police need this basic fact spelt out to them? Surely you know this, it is a fundamental part of your job.

It is very apparent that the Police do not treat all equally - take the vexed issue of the non crime hate incidents and Twitter spats women who complain about receiving death threats, rape threats, violent sexual abuse threats are told to just get off Twitter or Facebook, whereas the special caste who complain about a limerick or the words sex is immutable get the full on treatment, they don't get told to get of Twitter or Facebook if they don't like what they are reading. Misogyny - no surprise - is not considered a hate crime nor does it reach the bar for a non crime hate incident so that is not treating all the public equally is it?

At the FiLiA conference last year where were the Police when people were covering the square in front of the conference centre with vile sexually violent abuse directed at the attendees of the conference? Where were they when those outside were shouting vile sexually violent abuse at the attendees inside? Why were these people not removed? We all know damn well if the people inside had been of the special sacred caste the arrests of those outside would have been in full flow.

The Police should be totally and utterly politically and everything else neutral whilst doing their job that is the only way to serve the public fairly and equally. No plastering cars in rainbow decals - you don't do it for any other cause do you? No wearing of any badges, lanyards, etc., promoting any particular cause or politics. If the Police are going to continue to promote causes then they have to do it for every single cause. Attending Pride parades as part of their work to police the parade is just that - police the parade, no joining in, no dancing, no wearing stupid costumes or badges. Police who want to attend and participate in the Parade do it on your own time, on your own dime and in your own clothes. Taxpayers are not paying you to party at Pride they are paying you to police it as they pay you to police any other parade or protest.

Police Twitter or Facebook or any other Social Media accounts run by the Police Force should be for generic information regarding crimes, etc., in the local area NOT for preaching about fucking pronouns or anything along those lines.

I appreciate that many front line officers are unhappy and don't ascribe to this but there are far too many that do and far too many up the chain that do too. Speak up, speak out, get your union on it, support initiatives to rid the Police of this because ultimately it is you who will suffer as the public increasingly turns against the Police due to the perception being given off. You Police by consent of the public that consent is wearing thin.