Crime figures to rise!?! Surely you jest.

Apparently a leaked government report says that recorded crime is set to rise for the first time in ages.
I can't understand why they haven't just came up with another new way of recording crime to massage the figures again like they've always done in the past.
My force has a great way of reducing robberies. Victims are told " No... you haven't been robbed. What happened was you were assaulted and then a nanosecond later you had something stolen. "
The government strategy group that leaked this report goes on to say that the prison population is expected to increase by 20,000 and that the government should consider some radical measures to combat this such as :-
1. Rationing the amount of alcohol people can buy!
2. Prescribing heroin instead of methadone to addicts!
3. Chemical castration for sex offenders.
I can't help thinking that the author of that report has been taking away to a padded room for speaking some common sense. I wish I could get in on one of these groups as an official police adviser. ( Drifts into daydream mode to the sounded of doo doo doodoo type music )
Point 1 Minister. Definately, with the exception of serving police officers who like to partake of the odd snifter to unwind at the end of the day.
Point 2 my Lord. Excellent idea. Lets give them some really pure stuff and then the majority of them will overdose thereby reducing both the amount of offenders and crime. Plus there's the added benefit to the economy of increased business for undertakers and florists.
Point 3 El Presidente. Now your talking....but why just chemical castration? Lets go the whole hog and chop em off. And why stop at sex offenders? Burglars too. I hate them, and shoplifters and car thieves and muggers and.. and... and....yeah...druggies..oh I forgot, we're poisoning them aren't we?
Can I also suggest my leader, the reinstatement of corporal punishment? You know for minor offences like criminal damage, common assault, public order, being cheeky to police, having a tattoo, facial piercings, that type of thing.
Also to boost moral we get to administer it ourselves. We'd need a big room though so you could get a good run up before you swing.
While we're on a roll highness might I suggest more annual leave and higher wages? And mean looking black suped up patrol cars like the Yanks so we're faster than the enemy, sorry offenders. And badges, big shiny gold ones and bomber jackets with badges and Captains instead of Inspectors and Lootenants and Awwficers instead of being called Constables and partners and doughnuts and stun guns and.......
I've gone dizzy now.

Downtime.

This is another favourite of mine.
A buzzword that has been cascaded down after a root and branch review for line supervisors to orate to their personnel... "Downtime."
I don't know if it happens in other forces but in mine I have to force myself not to visibly cringe when those words " can you utilise your downtime to......" by the time the saddo has uttered those six words I've gone into a catatonic trance where I'm only capable of nodding my head and muttering "uhhum", which used to be solely reserved for my wife as she attempted to engage me in conversation whilst I'm watching the footy.
The only downtime I get is arriving at work and finding to my despair that we have a full compliment of " Line Supervisors " to try and pick holes in everything we do.
Sometimes however we are saved as a line supervisor with the usual compliment of bird shit on their shoulder boards announces a meeting with his/her underlings and off they trot to waffle for hours.

Good pursuit

Can I go on a working exchange holiday to one of these forces? I can feel the stress ebbing away.

Why do the Yanks get all the fun?

This so much more fun than "Can you blow into this device in one long continuous breath until I say stop." Click on the link and see what you think.

If only senior officers in the UK were like this.

I'd give up a months pay ( and no I can't afford it! ) to have a boss like this. Makes you feel like kicking the bin over and shouting stuff.

Reflections on today and yesteryear.

I was sitting in the control room the other day, shining my arse, looking at the ever increasing mountain of jobs outstanding when it struck me. Why? Why does the list of jobs keep getting bigger when the amount of stuff we don't deal with anymore keeps growing?
At the start of the 90's when according to the government we had far less Police Officers than today the parade room was always full of officers and we dealt with stuff that today has long been discarded such as :-
School Crossing patrol cover. Where did that go?
Parking Offences. Now in the hands of local authorities.
Noisy parties. Sorry thats a council matter.
Collecting found property. Can you bring it to the station as we're busy.
Forged currency. Then, required a crime report and evidence bag. Now, take it to the bank.
Audible alarms. Complain to the council about the noise.
There's probably more but it escapes me at the moment and yet we still managed a lot better than today.
I have my theory on why. We used to be regarded as a Police Force not a service. A semi military run emergency response force. NOT a business!
We are supposed to deal with situations that need an effective and firm response.
Instead we're given performance indicators, league tables and monthly appraisals, all of which takes our focus away from what we should be doing, our job, and instead leaves us with the sad FACT that the reason we are wearing stab proof vests is to protect us from the knives that are being wielded by our line supervisors ( didn't they used to be called Sgts? ) in order for them to be able to evidence to their managers that they have lost the ability of common sense and are therefore suitable to climb up the promotion ladder where backbone and integrity are not essential requirements.
And breathe...
We used to have effective leaders which encouraged us to stand together, look out for each other. These days if you voice an opinion that actually makes sense you stand out, you are asked by your team leaders to reflect on what you have said, you realise that suddenly you are standing alone and in silence as everyone else is just relieved that you have taken the attention away from them. Anyway, that's enough for my first rant. Back to taking complaints from Joe Public about how crap we are and how much better we were in the early 90's.....