Honoured

I have been greatly honoured by being asked to keep my own forum on the Tie Tacs Police Forums.

Thanks a lot Paul and Dave, will try to repay your confidence in me by hopefully posting a few witisms.

Read my blog forum and the other forums here

http://www.stirling-uotc.co.uk/PMTTS/



© Bob Slot 2007

"I hate your lot!"

I was out with a friend of mine the other night; we had a couple of drinks and then things got around (As they often do) to “I hate your lot!” (It didn’t end up with “I love you” or “You’re my best mate you are” We didn’t drink quite that many)

Now, I have known this mate of mine since we were at Infants school together. We have been mates over 30 years, we have always hung around together, he was best man at my wedding etc. You might say he’s my best buddy.

He is a hardworking, tax paying man, never been arrested, perhaps had a ticket for not wearing his seatbelt once in his youth, Joe Average really, not someone with any particular axe to grind.

But yet he is very anti Police, and although I don’t particularly agree with him, I can sympathise with his point of view. Let me explain…

I was out walking with this friend of mine one day (Walking around Hills and Mountains is my passion, one of them anyway!) And on getting back to his car we discovered it to be quite badly damaged, the bumper was hanging off, someone had obviously hit him and driven off. Now he was obviously a little shocked, but then seeing that someone had left a note on his windscreen he saw a glimmer of hope.

He opened the note and read it, (No it wasn’t that old chestnut “Everyone thinks I’m leaving my details, but I’m not, so hard luck!” (That’s not a licence to use that one either by the way!)) It actually gave the registration number of the vehicle that had hit his and a bit of a summary of what had happened, all jotted down by a helpful witness.

He dropped me off at home and made plans to report it to the police, the next day I was at work and was walking through our front desk area when I bumped into my pal, he had come in to report the damage, the civilian counter clerk, seeing that I knew my friend decides ‘Ooh I might be able to left shoulder this one’ “Oh right” she says “If you know this man you can take the details for the accident report can’t you”

She was gently reminded that it was in fact her job, not mine and that since I was his friend and indeed was with him at the time of the accident, how could I possibly be seen as impartial?

Eventually she agreed, and after some raised eyebrows and a few thoughts of ‘Where has the professionalism of the police gone’ on behalf of my mate she took down his particulars (Oooh Eerr Missus) and off he went, with a freshly filled out producer form (Form HORT/1 for all in the know) because he hadn’t taken his driving licence with him.

Now when he gets home, can he find his driving licence? Can he hell! It’s disappeared into that place that things disappear into whenever it is extremely important that you find them. He applies for a new one, but obviously it doesn’t come in time for the seven day period in which he gets to produce it.

In the meantime the accident report is sent to a neighbouring rural force (We were out walking remember) to be allocated to an officer for further investigation.

Queue the long wait…. Over 3 months before he hears anything else (That Royal mail has a lot to answer for eh?) Then out of the blue an officer rings him up…

Officer “Yeah, it’s about that accident you reported”

My Mate “Oh yeah, great stuff, you got him”

Officer “No not yet, look I need some more details, where on the car was damaged?”

My Mate “Well, it was the front bumper”

Officer “Ok great, thanks that should do it, bye”

My Mate “Oh bye”

Then that’s it! That’s the end of the story.

My mate gets his car damaged by someone who can’t be arsed to leave his details, he reports it to a police employee who can only just be arsed to take some of his details down when she is ‘advised’ for trying to wangle her way out of it, she then sends it off to some other force, who sit on it for a while then give it to a bobby who either can’t be arsed to investigate it or if he has investigated it can’t be arsed to tell the victim. These are all his perceptions of the incident, but I think they are prety valid.

And what does the victim get….

A good bollocking off another counter clerk for producing his driving licence late!

So, yeah, I know where he is coming from really, and it’s a shame. If only we thought about these things a little more and worked on improving them, I’m sure we could improve the publics’ perception of the police.

If we are losing the support of people like my mate, then I think a serious think about a remedy is required. This is not his only dealings with the police and his views are not just based on this incident, however I will save the other stories for another time.

© Bob Slot 2007

C'est la vie

I was shopping the other day with my two children (Both aged under 10) when I had the misfortune to come across a real pair of losers, I will describe them for you…

Female aged about 17, 5’00” tall, about 6’00 around the waist, bleached blonde hair with coloured tints, wearing a white tracksuit top unzipped to reveal a pink cropped top allowing belly (Complete with stretch marks) to hang over tracky bottoms (3/4 Length of course) and white trainers.

Male 17-18 years 5’06” Extremely thin build. Gaunt facial features, black eye, scratch down cheek. Black tracksuit with baseball cap and hoody. Black gloves (For grafting) white Reebok classic trainers and of course tracky bottoms have to be tucked into the socks!

Both of them were wearing more gold than the US Federal Reserve! In fact, I think they must have been the Mayor and Mayoress of Chavtown.

Anyway, they were obviously very lost because they were in the book section of WH Smith (Unless Tricia or Jeremy Kyle have a new book out perhaps?) They seemed to have gone there for a good argument as far as I could see.

Only it wasn’t really a good argument it was more like a…..

Him “F**kin innit, Know what a mean!”

Her “No but, yeah but no, summat or nuffink”

That seemed to be about the extent of it to be honest, but it was getting more heated and the young chap had to restrain himself from punching the book displays a couple of times, he was getting really mad.

Now I didn’t really want my two children to witness this kind of language or behaviour, if I had wanted that I would have taken them to a busy town centre on a Saturday night rather than WH Smiths book section.

I thought for a moment about saying “I say, my dear fellow, would you care to moderate your language and behave with a little more decorum in front of my children, that's a good chap”

But having thought about the possible outcomes and deciding that it was only ever going to end in few rounds of fisticuffs I decided to take the easy option and walk away.

So WH Smiths loses a sale, and society takes another step forward into the pit of shite!

C'est la vie!

© Bob Slot 2007

The Secret Policeman and The Fear of not being Politically Correct

You remember back to 2003 and the secret Policeman business right?

OK, well let me say first of all, Mark Daly (Whatever you may think of him) did his job very well, and the fact that he was able to root out a few stupidly racist and bigoted police recruits was all very good stuff.

Having said that, I have never come across any racist behaviour or language from any police officers whilst I have been in the service. (Perhaps because I haven't been looking for it, I don't know)

Let me say for the record "I AM NOT A RACIST, AND TO THE BEST OF MY KNOWLEDGE NEITHER ARE ANY OF MY COLLEAGUES" I just want to be allowed to get on with my job!

However pressure from politicians and senior officers regarding what you can and can't say and what is and isn't PC nowadays has resulted in officers being terrified of saying the wrong things.

Let me give you a perfect example that happened to me this week.... (All the names are changed)

Now I am sure you are fully aware of the great Hollywood actor Ishmael K Johnson? No? He was in that film about the serpents on a train or something and in that other film with the guy from Grease who used to dance, where they talk about cheeseburgers and shoot people, yeah you know him now, the black guy, likes to play golf, great actor. One of my favourites. (Bear with me now, I had the change to names here right!)

Now, also be aware of Ishmael Johnson the petty car thief and up and coming villain aged 17 (He is a white guy, just to clarify). Our Ishmael was in custody at my police station the other day and was awaiting me to come and deal with him, I was busy finishing off other things at this time. (Coffee and doughnuts most probably)

Please bear in mind also, that I have never met either Ishmael Johnson Car thief or Ishmael K Johnson Hollywood actor at this stage (I bet you can guess which I have met by the end of this story)

The custody Sergeant (Who happens to be black, but I mention this only because it may be pertinent to the story) decides I am taking a little too long eating my doughnuts or investigating rapes and murders or whatever it is I was doing, so decides to come to look for me.

He finds me, hands over the paperwork I need to do my job, and enquires how long I will be, on being handed the paperwork and reading the name Ishmael Johnson I remark "Oh, it's not Ishmael K Johnson is it"

His reply "YOU CAN'T SAY THAT!!!" The inference being that I had made some sort of racist remark!

WHAT???? Which bit of my question, in any way, or on any level, and on who's world could possibly be considered as racist?

I then spent the rest of my shift worried sick, and going over the two line conversation over and over again checking that I was OK. I even ran it by my colleagues several times, just to double check.

This is the kind of police service we now work in. People are terrified of saying the wrong thing, or even of saying the right thing but it being misinterpreted.

Incidentally, I am led to believe that the The Secret Policeman affair didn't just take into account racism, I am reliably informed that one officer was "moved" after making comments about David Blunketts' dog!

I wonder what would have happened if a member of the Gestapo had made disparaging remarks about Hitlers beloved German shepherd Blondi?

He would have probably been moved to the other side of the Reich, I guess.

© Bob Slot 2007

I Pay Your Wages!

I wonder how many times I have heard the words "I Pay your Wages!" (1) uttered. Usually as I point out a poor motorists wrongdoings, it is only topped by "Haven't you anything better to do?"(2) or "Haven't you got any burglars to catch?"(3)

These situations can often deteriorate into "I'm going to complain! You will be sitting behind a desk by the end of the week!"(4) or "I'll have your job"(5)

Now you might think that I deserve these comments if I go out of my way to persecute innocent motorists. (You might be right) However next time you get stopped by the police, just remember, I didn't stop you for nothing, and as you hurl your threats and insults at me I am probably just deciding if I can use my discretion and issue a warning for your minor infringement of the law or whether I need to put pen to paper and have a summons issued. (Nuff said?)

Incidentally the answers to the above questions are as follows;

1) Yes you may pay my wages, but since I pay my taxes so do I!

2) Yes I have better things to do, but unfortunately having to deal with you is abstracting me from those much more important duties.

3) Burglars, Yes please, do you know where there are any?

4) Great, thanks, I have been after a nice indoors 9-5 job for years.

5) You can have it now, do you think this uniform will fit you? I will have your shell suit!

© Bob Slot 2007

Christmas and New Year Hangovers

Hope all the Christmas and New Year Hangovers have cleared now, especially for all the folks who attended the Christmas Do at the Kings Head Hotel in Wimborne.

Brawl at police Christmas party

Since when has a bit of a scuffle in a pub made national news? I could tell the BBC about thousands of pub fights I have attended, do you think they would be interested?

© Bob Slot 2007

The Home Office "Fighting Police Bureaucracy"

My first post of the year, Happy New Year, all the best to you and yours!

In 2004 the Home Office set up the "Policing Bureaucracy Gateway" part of a package of measures to "free up police officers' time from unnecessary bureaucracy and paperwork."

Sorry if I haven't noticed it, but in my experience it seems to be exactly the opposite.

Let us say for example that someone spilled something (Coffee most likely) on one of my uniform shirts and all the best efforts of Daz and even better New Daz failed to remove the offending stain. Now you might say to me "OK Bobby, get yourself a new shirt"

Well, getting a new shirt for me would involve the following procedure...

1) Write out a report on the correct form (Lets say a GB338 for arguments sake) explaining in full why a new shirt is required, how the old one came to be damaged and what the damage consists of.

2) Take the report and the damaged shirt to my Inspector for him/her to Inspect the damage (Do you think this is how Inspectors got their name) and then if he/she agrees that I need a replacement he/she must support the application and sign the form.

3) Get into a vehicle (My own more often than not, because I don't have access to a police vehicle) and drive the two mile journey across town to my divisional headquarters, with my damaged shirt and the report form duly signed. (You might ask why I don't walk, would you walk along carrying a coffee stained shirt and an A4 form that you needed to keep in pristine condition. We don't walk around with shopping trolleys you know! (Although that's not a bad idea for the suggestion scheme!))

4) Speak with the Divisional budget holder or the budget holders deputy in his/her absence and plead my case for a new shirt, allowing him/her to study the stain in detail for suggestions on other, cheaper ways of getting around the problem. It is at this point that my little scam is most likely to fail. My previous allocation of shirts for the past 15 years will be studied in great detail to make sure there is no pattern of staining and swapping occurring, and that I have not already taken my allocated number of shirts for the decade. If the budget holder agrees (They usually don't) then he/she has to support my application further by adding his/her signature to the form GB338. At this point I run off clutching my signed form and shouting 'fools'

5) I then have to attend the admin department taking along my signed report to the admin assistant who is in charge of the requisition form book. I am then allowed (Under the supervision of the administration assistant) to fill in (In duplicate) the next blank form in the book (Lets call this form a RQ133) In order to do this correctly I need to also study a catalogue roughly the size of several inner city telephone directories in order to obtain the correct order code for a male police officers shirt size 15" neck (Who am I trying to kid?) Once I have found the code (Something along the lines of polmalshir00015) and filled in the form correctly I can attach my form GB338 to the copy of the form RQ133 that stays in the book and detach the duplicate form RQ133 with which I can hopefully swap for a shirt.

6) However that's not all. So far I have only succeeded in being supplied with a piece of paper! I then need to get back in my vehicle and drive the two miles back to my Inspector. As his/her job title suggests he/she will then inspect my form RQ133, and assuming he/she finds it to his/her satisfaction (Assuming also that he/she hasn't gone home in the meantime) he/she will sign it authorising me to obtain a shirt.

7) I am now left with a choice, I can now send the completed form through the internal mail (in which case I will probably never see it or said shirt again) or I can drive the five miles or so to my forces' clothing and equipment stores in order to collect it myself. I think I will do the latter.

8) Drive to the clothing store, be met by several obnoxious stores staff (The word Jobsworth was invented for these guys) drinking tea and whose first comment will be "Have you got an appointment, we can't see anyone without an appointment!"

9) Lets assume here that I did phone ahead and waited the three weeks until my appointment date so can answer "Yes I do have an appointment, thank you, and what is more I also have a correctly obtained and duly signed form RQ133 allowing me to procure from you one shirt, my fine man!"

10) Hand over the form and be told "You'll be lucky pal, we've had no size 15" shirts since 1977, they are on back order, the supplier says we will 'ave 'em Tuesday week"

At this point I hand over my form (never to see or hear anything about it again most probably) go back to my place of work, get my coat on and go home.

That might sound ridiculous to you, but in all honesty it's not far from the truth. I could have probably made my own shirt in the time it takes to obtain one.

It's also worthy of note that this policy was introduced SINCE 2004! It has been brought in because of the massive deficit in funding that my force has suffered over the past few years.

Fighting Bureaucracy?

© Bob Slot 2007