Police not being Properly Vetted.

[TIGHTCHOKE]

A story from the BBC  that shows a lot of Police Forces fail to properly vet their staff despite changes in legislation in 2006.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47073883?intlink_from_url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/localnews/2633727-Wittering/0&link_location=live-reporting-story

Of the 16 Forces that answered the Freedom of Information questions, nearly 6000 staff are out of date on their 10 yearly retrospective checks.

Not the fault of the individuals, but yet another failure of those Forces that choose not to comply!

[Walker570]

Vetted for what ?   In my day you had an annual 15 minute meeting with your Divisional Commander.  The year I retired myself and another senior PC approached our Inspector about our concerns about one of our team. We knew he was mixed up with a major criminal gang.  His reply  " Political dynamite, cannot do anything "... you have probably guessed already, he was of colour.  Now we had a number of other brilliant officers of a similar skin colour who agreed with us, but nothing was done.  After I retired I heard the person we reported was done for laundering drug money whilst still in the job.  We vetted ourselves back in my day.   Plus you can get up to a lot of naughty things in the interveneing ten years. What a load of rubbish.

[243deer]

Is this yet another case of government saying something must be done and then not funding it?

[Westward]

As I've commented a number of times before... The police no longer operate as a service to the public and under the direction of our elected government. They have maneouvred themselves into a position of being akin to a paramilitary response force where they determine their own priorities and responsibilities and, as we all know only too well, when it suits their purposes they will "adjust" statutory laws without reference to any higher authority. Of course they have no right to do so but those in a position to control them appear to ignore it.

The ever increasing detachment between the police, the public and the government is deeply concerning and most unhealthy and IMO, as long as the majority of chief officers are drawn from fast tracked graduates who've never worked at the sharp end so to speak, nothing will improve until the Home Office stops sleep walking where the police are concerned.

Edited February 6, 2019 by Westward

[Walker570]

10 minutes ago, Westward said:

As I've commented a number of times before... The police no longer operate as a service to the public and under the direction of our elected government. They have maneouvred themselves into a position of being akin to a paramilitary response force where they determine their own priorities and responsibilities and, as we all know only too well, when it suits their purposes they will "adjust" statutory laws without reference to any higher authority. Of course they have no right to do so but those in a position to control them appear to ignore it.

The ever increasing detachment between the police, the public and the government is deeply concerning and most unhealthy and IMO, as long as the majority of chief officers are drawn from fast tracked graduates who've never worked at the sharp end so to speak, nothing will improve until the Home Office stops sleep walking where the police are concerned.

ABSOLUTELY 100%  and I saw it all happening from 1974 to 1990 when I retired and it has not improved.

Just read the obituary of a Sergeant in the Birmingham Police Force. He joined back in 1951 , received 3 Watch Committee awards, 17 commendations and had a Royal Humane Society Certificate for sving a baby's life. He retired in 1981. He then joined the Probation Service where his experience was invaluable and he was also involved with the St John's Ambulance finally becoming County Commander having completed 43yrs of voluntary service.  No, he wasn't Knighted, didn't become a Lord, he was just a humble Sergeant.

I need not go further really but why or how just being a Chief Constable or being able to hit a tennis ball accurately or play a guitar makes you eligible to be awarded a Knighthood etc.,

makes my blood boil, when the likes of Retired Sergeant Tom Hurley go unrecognised.

 

[Westward]

1 hour ago, Walker570 said:

 why or how just being a Chief Constable or being able to hit a tennis ball accurately or play a guitar makes you eligible to be awarded a Knighthood etc.,

Or for that matter reading the tv news for a few years...

Like you, I've never quite understood the rationale of giving someone an honour for simply doing the job they're paid to do.

The Police Force today, in operating to their own agenda rather than according to wishes of the people they are supposed to serve, has become the very thing that parliament most feared back in the early 19th century when the idea of a formal, structured, uniformed police service was being debated. It took years before parliament was willing to vote for the police to be formed and even then only because of the existence of the Police Charter. For 100 plus years police officers were defined as citizens in uniform with a few extra powers and they were run according to the charter and under the direction of the Home Office.

I wonder if any of today's slick, politically astute, TV friendly senior officers, have ever heard of the Police Charter.

[The Burpster]

2 hours ago, Walker570 said:

Vetted for what ?   In my day you had an annual 15 minute meeting with your Divisional Commander.  The year I retired myself and another senior PC approached our Inspector about our concerns about one of our team. We knew he was mixed up with a major criminal gang.  His reply  " Political dynamite, cannot do anything "... you have probably guessed already, he was of colour.  Now we had a number of other brilliant officers of a similar skin colour who agreed with us, but nothing was done.  After I retired I heard the person we reported was done for laundering drug money whilst still in the job.  We vetted ourselves back in my day.   Plus you can get up to a lot of naughty things in the interveneing ten years. What a load of rubbish.

Know exactly what you mean! 😉 Even as a trainer and active tutor, unless it was a hetero white male if there were any ‘issues’ you might as well forget raising them as **** all would happen and you actually made things worse for yourself if you did! 

Same happened to some degree during my time as a Fed rep, although it made defending them easy for all the wrong reasons.... 😡

To alleviate those concerned on this issue, every officer has a deep vetting when they join including family members so it’s not easy to slip though the net. Those forces that haven’t renewed vetting on serving officers have other ways of finding out those that are  ‘in the wrong profession’ shall we say......