That's not happening in west Mercia or West Midlands so unsure which force that rumour has originated from. In west Mercia specials have been given the opportunity to join OPUS, ie road policing, dogs. No further training however.
The Police Application Thread
- Thread starter Burnsy2023
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It's another force
Good to read you re part of the investigation process burnsy, specials don't have that in my force. Can you interview in custody on your own and compile full mg files (6cde etc)? If so that's pretty cool
Yep, interview in custody, CPS advice and then full file prep. I'm getting more training soon for things like mobile phone examinations plus lock drilling/snapping, so that's also going to be useful.
It's really dependent on force and how forward thinking the Chief officers are. More and more are realizing the potential though.
would be a massive help!
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We don't get any of that either, which is a shame. I envy those who are in such forces!
GMP seem to be really mixed. On the hand, officially all specials are aligned to the INPT teams, and should parade on and work with them. Unofficially, lots of us work response, take on jobs etc. I'm not interview trained personally, but the training is available (albeit its the regular weekday course).
Personally I mix double crewing with response officers to working single crewed. Single crewed in theory I'm INPT, so usually start off doing INPT taskings, but response are that short, most comms ops just send us to jobs the same as the regs. I'll often be the only patrol available for grade 1 jobs (which is where GMP's driving policy is really frustrating).
Personally I mix double crewing with response officers to working single crewed. Single crewed in theory I'm INPT, so usually start off doing INPT taskings, but response are that short, most comms ops just send us to jobs the same as the regs. I'll often be the only patrol available for grade 1 jobs (which is where GMP's driving policy is really frustrating).
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I know your frustrations about the driving policy. I asked the CC to review it last year which he agreed to, it's still under review as is L2 PO training. I'm not sure how it'll end up. I think they probably will offer the training at some point but it's how long they drag their heels.
I know many forces align Specials to NPT but I'm aligned to response and it's one of the primary reasons I'm as useful as I am. I find the more you invest in Specials, the more you get out.
Unfortunately every time we ask we get "Special Constables are aligned to INPT teams and do not require driving authorities to complete their taskings". Mr Fahy once replied, when asked, that the Special Constables role was traditionally one done on foot.
While officially we're an INPT resource, I don't think it'll happen regardless of whats actually happening on the ground.
While officially we're an INPT resource, I don't think it'll happen regardless of whats actually happening on the ground.
All specials in the Met do basic public order training. A few receive moderate public order training and none have received the highest levels of training unless they previously received it as regular officer.
Man of Honour
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I'm currently tasked with the most dreaded task of all police work. Any guesses what it is ?
Given budget and time restraints, it is a better use of both to train regulars than specials who, in theory, will use it far more often.
If all regulars are trained then training specials should be considered.
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Constant obs on someone who has just **** themself?
I think that a less crude financial decision should be made. I agree that some training is so expensive it's hard to justify most Specials getting, but there are always exceptions. As for L2, you need to do a cost analysis on how much it costs to abstract your regular officers and how much return an individual special may give if L2 is available to them. If you have a Special who will police every football game running (because they're motivated and many of the pre-planned ops requiring a PSU fall out of normal 9-5 work hours), then it may actually be more cost efficient to give some specials training to save OT and abstractions to backfill.
Like most people, I sometimes clench my fist in frustration and exasperation at some police related occurrences.
However, I do get to see the other side of the coin and can appreciate the stress that many in the police have to deal with.
My other half is one of the corporate communications officers for Hampshire Constabulary (kind of imagine a press officer, the spokeperson that you often hear in media reports when they refer to "a police spokesperson said") , and some of the stresses and sheer weight of work that she has to deal with is unbelievable.
However, I do get to see the other side of the coin and can appreciate the stress that many in the police have to deal with.
My other half is one of the corporate communications officers for Hampshire Constabulary (kind of imagine a press officer, the spokeperson that you often hear in media reports when they refer to "a police spokesperson said") , and some of the stresses and sheer weight of work that she has to deal with is unbelievable.
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Small world. What area (Western/Eastern/Northern)? She may have given me my Twitter training...
Small world. What area (Western/Eastern/Northern)? She may have given me my Twitter training...
Eastern
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Eastern
Cool, not the person I was thinking of, but I've certainly had an email or two from your OH
This isn't the thread for that thanks.
Cool, not the person I was thinking of, but I've certainly had an email or two from your OH
lol, well theres a few eastern comms officers, so might be another that you've had emails off, but could well be
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A full nightshift on scene preservation. Not long back and goodnight.
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That's bad, but constant obs is worse. You can turn off to some degree on a scene guard, you can't on a high risk detainee who is in hospital intent on harming themselves.
My colleague and I took over from two other officers who were at hospital with a DP for a domestic at around 2300. He was heavily in drink, "fighty" and constantly wanting to get off the bed. He was handcuffed and a right PITA.
He had diarrhea (communicable stomach bug) and then proceeded to deffocate himself. Great. Myself and my colleague then started taking turns to wait in the now horrifically smelling room and wait outside whilst the nurses organised themselves to sort him out.
Two nurses came into the room and started trying to get him up so they could strip him and clean him. He then stated he needed to urinate urgently, so they put him down again and got a kommode. As they had lifted him up **** started running down his leg and onto the floor so one nurse started cleaning that up. The other nurse wheeled in a kommode and I offered to help lift him onto it as the room was quite small. The removed his trousers and we started to manouver him onto it. As we lifted him onto the kommode he **** himself again, however it missed the centre of the commode and hit the edge spraying the whole room in liquid, brown, bacteria infested **** like a horriffic garden sprinkler. I almost was sick there and then. The nurses warned me not to put my hands anywhere my mouth and carried on like the steely troopers they are.
I couldn't scrub hard enough in the shower when I got home at 8am but I never felt clean enough. So yeah, I'd take a night scene guard over that any day.