The Systematic De-skilling of the Police

The current coalition Government is receiving a lot of criticism at the moment for cuts and proposed changes to the Police service in the UK. Sitting Governments always get the most stick but, as with a lot of things, there is a bigger picture to this. In an earlier blog I described how my own politics have evolved as I've got older. I no longer believe that any of the political parties hold the keys to Utopia; they're all as flawed as each other. The truth is, that the political system is slowly but surely de-skilling the Police service, and it's been happening for some time.

I'm sure there are readers out there older and more experienced than me that remember other examples. The first one I'm aware of was the role of Scenes of Crime Officer (SOCO). This was gradually removed from police officers and non-sworn police employees took on these tasks.

My own personal involvement with the Police service began with my attestation as a Special Constable in October 1998. The Special Constabulary is (or was) an important resource for most Constabularies. In case you are not familiar with the Special Constabulary, they are unpaid volunteers who are fully sworn and attested Police officers, with the same powers of arrest and by and large the same equipment. In most forces, the only way of distinguishing between a Special Constable and a PC is a small 'SC' insignia on the epaulettes, and sometimes a different cap badge.

Specials come from all parts of the community, and I would imagine that most of them volunteer for duties at evenings and weekends. This works well, as it allows forces to bolster their numbers at peak times such as Friday and Saturday nights, and for other special events such as Remembrance Sunday or concerts etc requiring additional police presence. The Police are thus able to meet peaks in demand without a large increase in overtime or without diverting officers away from routine and response duties. It's no exaggeration to say that some communities would not be patrolled regularly if it were not for volunteer Special Constables.

Specials receive out-of-pocket expenses for travelling and subsistence, but no payment. We as a group had long campaigned to be put of retainers in the same way that the Territorial Army (TA) and Retained Firefighters are. The Treasury refused to do this, claiming that it would be too expensive.

In the early part of the 2000s, the Labour Government took the decision to introduce Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs). These are uniformed Police employees who undertake certain routine duties for the police such as statement taking, but do NOT have powers of arrest (other than Common Law "civilian arrest" powers that everyone has). However, and this is crucial, PCSOs also patrol areas. Sometimes with fully sworn Police Officers, but sometimes alone. PCSOs do an important job, but when it comes to patrol, it's basically Neighbourhood Watch with a police uniform and radio. They often don't carry handcuffs or other protective equipment. This was the cynical part of the process that ultimately lead to my departure from the Special Constabulary. The introduction of PCSOs to patrol duties was nothing but a trick, an illusion, to fool the general public into thinking that there were more uniformed police officers on duty that there really were.

The creation of the position of PCSOs must have cost the Home Office millions of pounds. I'd be interested to hear from anyone that has the exact figure. The legislation had to be drafted, training designed and delivered, not to mention the recruitment process. This money could have been spent properly rewarding existing an new Specials - for which there was no need to create additional legislation, training or administration. The basic premise of PCSOs might have been sound, but somewhere along the line, someone in the Home Office took the opportunity to trick the public and start the mass de-skilling of police duties. The thin end of the wedge was truly in progress.

So it comes as no surprise now that the latest wheeze out of such pinnacles of logical thinking as the Home Office, ACPO and Policy Exchange that we are now staring down the barrel of private patrol services. The fact that it's no surprise doesn't make it any less frightening though. We only have to look at most examples of Government procuring and outsourcing (not to mention privatisation of national services) to say that it's a racing certainty that it'll end in disaster. There's too many examples to mention. Railways, water and energy utilities, buses..... I could go on but I won't.

So what's behind it all? The most likely explanation (apart from some weird class thing going on) is cost. It costs a lot to employ a police officer. This is no surprise because most are vastly skilled and experienced at what they do. It's a difficult and stressful job. However, the likes of Blair Gibbs and Theresa May either don't understand this or don't want to. Their agenda is to dumb down the police service as much as possible to drive cost out of it, to lower the expectations of the public as to what they can expect from a police service, and reduce the skill sets "required". They are being aided and abetted in this by unscrupulous and dishonest elements of the media who are only too happy to get their revenge on the police who've recently dropped them right in it.

Would any of this be happening if Labour was in power? Probably, but maybe with certain subtle differences in execution. They wouldn't have the overall support of the press, that's for sure. But in the end, it makes no difference. Because Governments of all colours have been engaged in the systematic de-skilling of the police service for decades.