www.thetimes.co.uk/article/vile-sexists-at-gwent-police-hounded-me-out-of-the-force-th99gfp5s
Iam disappointed but not surprised by your investigation of sexual harassment by Gwent police officers (“Phone reveals new police shame”, News, last week). Forty-four years ago I joined Gwent as a naive 18-year-old. I left ten months later, frightened and disillusioned. For the next ten years I would cross the road if I saw a police officer.
During my training I was the only woman. We probationers would be described as “Gwent police, a fine body of men — and Sue, who’s just a fine body”. I was stationed in the Welsh Valleys along with any male who’d caused concern in Newport, including an officer who had been reported for looking in through bathroom windows while on duty. I was allocated a training sergeant, who I believe thought he was being helpful when he advised me not to become the “station bike”.
Women were expected to wear a tight pencil skirt with no pleat. This was impossible to march in, and I was berated for not keeping up. After passing out I was interviewed by about eight senior officers — who sat at a semicircular table while I was made to stand in the centre — and asked if, as the only woman on the course, I could suggest how things might be improved. I said the uniform put me at a disadvantage. I was asked to turn through 360 degrees, twice: all the officers leered and one said: “It looks great to me.”
The assistant chief constable told me I wouldn’t last two years and it was probably a waste of money training me. I was determined to prove him wrong but I was terrified of staying. After leaving, I was presented with a bill for my uniform.
It is so disappointing to see that nothing has changed.
Sue Riley, Abergavenny