Stop and Search, Armed Police and Sophie

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I was going to have a quite day today, but Sophie Khan, amongst others, has put paid to that. Said lady has taken time of from Taser Patrol to enter the argument on Armed Police. See her Timeline, I can’t bring myself to even Copy/Paste that level of rubbish.

In the last week I have seen much discontent about a variety of topics in the Media. RIPA, Armed Police and Stop and Search are the three that occupy me most this morning, and my view is simply that there is nothing wrong with ANY of them.

I’m not living on a nice pink, fluffy cloud thinking that all is well in the world, but neither do I want to see perfectly valuable tools in the Police Toolbox blunted or stolen.

Looking at the ludicrous article in The Times about Armed Police attending ‘normal’ incidents, so what? The government has chosen to reduce the number of Police on our streets that are available to respond to the increased demand on them, what are they to do?

Be honest, just for 2 minutes. If you’ve been burgled, had your car stolen off your driveway and your granny has just been mugged and had her pension stole, when you phone the Police and they say “we’ve got nobody to send for then next 2 hours, or we could send you an Armed Officer immediately”, which would you choose? If you tell me you’d rather wait two hours than have an officer with a pistol turn up straight away I’d be tempted not to believe you.

There is NOTHING wrong with Armed Police turning up to deal with your emergency, it’s how they behave when they get there that matters, and they are PROFESSIONALS.

RIPA? I have nothing further to add to yesterday’s post, there’s nothing wrong with the existing legislation it’s the application and supervision that need to be monitored, supervised properly and consistently, each application being properly read at the supervision stage to ensure that it meets the criteria. If it does, what’s the problem? Tying the hands of the Police to suit the baying journos and politicians helps society how?

TASER, briefly, is the same. As long as the officers have received a sufficient level of training, and all the relevant policies and guidelines have been complied with, what on earth is the problem? Are we surrounded by a Nation of Police Officers firing off their TASERs randomly every time they jump out of their cars? Or are they being used only when necessary? Yes, mistakes may occasionally happen, but an honest mistake should be forgiven. Reckless and inappropriate use of TASER is different. Is that really what’s happening out there?

Finally, Stop and Search. It’s quite possible, probable if you prefer, that Stop and Search has been misused and abused by a small number of officers is that a reason to call. For its abolition? I don’t think so. My view is really quite consistent. Train your officers so that they know what they have to do. Monitor the Stop/Search records and make the Supervising Officers SUPERVISE. Every supervisor is a volunteer. They have all applied to be one. It is not compulsory, they take the increased salaries every month, let them earn their corn and bloody supervise at grass roots level. Root out malpractice and develop a body of officers who know the reasons and grounds for Stop/Search, know how to put it in to practice and how to do It without offending the person being Stop/Searched. I always found people to be perfectly reason if they were dealt with respectfully and had things explained to them. The small percentage that will vociferously object to being stopped because they protest their innocence and the Police have only picked on them for whatever reason can be totally silenced by the impending issue of bodycams allied with consistent professionalism. Once again, no reason to scrap the whole system, concentrate on applying the existing system properly

I’m perfectly certain that the vast majority of the Great British public don’t want to see their police hamstrung by being deprived of their ‘tools’. To give in to the baying minority is the weak, lazy option. Strong leadership with effective supervision will solve all these problems without weakening the Police effectiveness. Why on earth are we even bothering to listen to the likes of Sophie Khan and her ilk? (That’s me Blocked then). Even Professional Standards can’t object to that surely?

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1 thought on “Stop and Search, Armed Police and Sophie”

  1. Effective and consistent supervision is particularly important in this age of SuperNintendos and Direct Entry Inspectors who really do need to be able to hit the ground running and implement a system they will have no prior knowledge of. Maybe then we will regain Public Confidence. I can only hope that the College’s syllabus for them is up to the job.

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