Fight the good fight

Have you ever worked for an organisation, one half of which seems to value the contribution you make whilst the other half want to undermine you whenever they can ?

Have you completed a job of work that you are quite proud to do yet pick up a paper, be it a National or the local rag and you will probably find an article telling you and everyone else just what a pointless invention you were and why you should be scrapped as a "failed experiment".

Well I have and I do and I can tell you that after nearly 5 years of this constant sniping even the most thick skinned amongst us start to wonder whether it is really worthwhile. Well, if you don't like it why not become a "proper" policeman you might say. Why not indeed but to suggest this is to fall into the same trap that the press do and to fail to understand the role of the Police Community Support Officer (PCSO) and where it fits into the policing family. PCSO's are not here to hand out fines or detect crime as the press would let you believe but to create that link between communities and the police that a police officer in a car can never do. For those of you old enough to remember the old "bobby" on the beat with his bike, smile and clip round the ear (can't do this anymore though) then you are getting closer. Communities want a uniform presence on the streets to deal with the small annoyances that affect their everyday lives such as dog fouling, neighbours that fall out, kids causing problems and that is what they get with a PCSO.

Take this role away and replace them with "fully trained" (I'm fully trained by the way for the role I perform) police officers and put them on the streets of Britain is the call. Mark my words they will be in cars driving around. Does this make them approachable ? Will you give them that snippet of intelligence about the alledged drug dealer in your road and will you share with them the concerns you have about your neighbourhood ? Difficult to do as they pass you at 30mph.

More Police Officers on the beat would undoubtedly be a good thing but it doesn't have to be a choice of one or the other. There are plenty of Police Officers (the fully trained ones) sitting in comfortable desk based jobs within most forces who could be deployed back to front-line policing. No need to spend money training new officers when there is this resource just waiting to be utilised to undertake the role they joined up for. Funny how this slips the mind of police officers own union when it comes to talking about the need for more officers "on the street".

After nearly 5 years it remains a strange feeling to go to work in the knowledge that not only do you have to try and prove your worth to Joe Public but you have to do so whilst at the same time you have individuals within the very organisation you represent doing their upmost to undermine you.

I can't think of many other occupations that this is currently happening, maybe you can but either way perhaps these differences of opinion could be set aside and we could all get on with doing what we joined up to do, serve the public and fight the good fight.