The Bristol Evening Post published the following reader’s letter last week:
I have just read about Bristol City Council providing £1.2 million to fund 40 new police community support officers (PCSOs) – if my maths are correct that's a salary of £30,000 each per year – wow – and I thought we were broke. [note – his maths is correct but the money isn’t just PCSO salaries].
So what will these "plastic policemen" actually do or contribute to crime fighting or citizen security in this great city of ours? […] I would be very interested to know the details of the measuring system that compares a PCSOs performance with that of a real police officer in fighting crime – but I won't hold my breath. What a total and utter waste of money – again.
Read the full letter. Silly in places, but the general point has merit; Police Community Support Officers do not possess equivalent powers to sworn officers, nor do they have the same deterrent effect on would-be criminals. Click here for my previous writing on the difference between PCSOs and sworn officers.
PC Martin Hudd, an Evening Post columnist, provided a response:
I had to reply to the total nonsense written by Cliff Vivien in the letters section of the Post dated June 8, 2009 relating to the work of the PCSOs within the police force. This gentleman either has no concept of their role or has been misinformed by his brother who he claims is a serving police officer.
I have worked with PCSOs at Fishponds Police Station almost since their incepton [sic] and whilst I can't speak for all officers, I have personally found them to be some of the most dedicated and professional officers on the district. It's not their role to be crimefighters, their roles are to free up regular police officers, provide a high-visible presence on the street and give public reassurance, a job they do to the highest standard. It's a misconception that police work is all about crimefighting, it's a lot more involved than that and, at times, requires an ongoing commitment, through no other reason that there is always another job around the corner. Officers sometimes only ever get the chance to put a sticky plaster over some of the problems we incur and the role of the PCSO allows us to give that person a more dedicated service, a friendly face and a point of contact where in the past there was none.
I extend an open invitation to Cliff Vivien to contact me at Fishponds Police Station and I will personally show him how the role of the PCSOs at Fishponds have enhanced their respective communities and freed up regular officers to do the core policing roles. I won't show him how we measure their success because you can't measure what you can't see and that's the reduction in the amount of mundane work they take off of the regular officers. I bet his brother doesn't complain about that.
PC Hudd is an operator, not a policy maker. Thus it’s not his fault that the Police are buried in paperwork, that criminal sentences are routinely halved as soon as a magistrate’s gavel hits the bench and perpetrators are put back on the street; that many parents seem unwilling to instil discipline in their children. These are societal problems with their roots in three generations of political tinkering and poor incentives from the welfare state. Blame Blair, Thatcher, Callaghan, Heath, Wilson et alia.
Equally, PC Hudd cannot be held to account for the collective philosophy of senior police officials in the UK, which has often emphasised the pursuit of vague goals such as social equality or community engagement over the more muscular business of feeling collars.
But there is one element of his response that troubles me:
[PCSOs] provide a high-visible presence on the street and give public reassurance. […] I will personally show him how [PCSOs have] freed up regular officers to do the core policing roles.
If street patrols are not the core of the police role, then what is?
I’d like to take PC Hudd up on his invitation (it was “open”), but having looked at the Avon & Somerset Constabulary’s website, there is no phone number or address listed for Fishponds Police Station.
