Interesting Times.

I’m sure you have all heard the comments that Police Officers appear to be getting younger by the year. It seems that after 20 or so years officers do appear to be getting younger. Perhaps this is a sign of getting older. Who knows ?

I had to head towards the hallowed halls of CTCC HQ for a bit of a chat with the fine new classes that will be the officers of tomorrow, today,  as it were. One of those talk thingies about how the Dogs section offers this and that, what you should not do is chased or confronted by one of our furry pets and that sort of thing. I was struck by a couple of things. Firstly how long until someone would ask if it hurts when one of our dogs bites someone and secondly how young they all looked.  Yes it does, very much and some of them did not appear to have started shaving yet, and that is just the male officers, who incidentally, were outnumbered by those who were not male officers.

At this point the new Force Strategic Guide on such matters, “dinosaurs and diversity”, was brought to my attention.  I will read this when I get a quiet moment alone.

I was even more struck by how young most of the training staff appear to be. Not just in age but in service as well. The various gang of tutors, facilitators and mentors appear to have little than a handful of years of experience each and few over full pensionable service between them. Some of them appear to have spent most of their service in this facilitating malarkey and it could be said that some might possibly be lacking in the operational experience credibility area.

This started me thinking, and that could be a bit worrying.

Exactly how could this perceived shortage of experience be brought to the fore and be beneficial in painting a real picture of life under the chequered headband of justice. I dare say that it is about how the facilitator-ship of this law and order experience is put over that is important but, I do fear that for the uninitiated in the ways of the real world, someone with less than a handful of years in Policing, at what I would call the sharp end, is as well versed in all areas of society as they might be leaves a little to be desired. Perhaps the answer is to push them out there and let them find out for themselves ?  They have no idea of what interesting times they are in for.

I was also worried at the extreme politeness and reservedness of the shiny new band of the nation’s finest. Had I put on my deranged man scenario I felt certain that most of them would have burst into tears or hidden under their chairs. I feel sure that number of complaints for being rude or being horrible will fall so someone will be happy.

What some of them will do when they get a smack in the mouth by someone who refuses to be arrested or has some other pathetic excuse for non-compliance  could be an interesting proposition. Also not a single ex-military amongst them, another worrying trend perhaps. Now there is a waste of a several years of life experiences to draw on.

Interesting Times ahead.