Public Order

Extremely busy day today assisting in the policing of a medium-size market town in the throws of a major public festival.

You've got to smile at the logic of a control room though who splits the staff onto two channels - those directly policing the event itself and those assisting. They kept shouting up on my channel for response officers (all, er, two of us) to attend incidents all over town, and more often than not they were sending us to locations mere yards away from the festival route.

"Offender is heading down so-and-so road..."

Right. So the half-a-dozen PSCO's right next door might've been a better option then, rather then getting me to fight my way through town in a response car with half the roads closed.

Ah well. We can but try.

Was thinking on a lonely drive how much I've seen in these eight-or-so weeks since I went independent in March. Dead bodies, house fires, car crashes, blood, vomit, foul language and abuse aplenty. And more often than not - long gawping stares from members of the public acting like they’ve never seen a Police Officer before.