{"id":20650,"date":"2019-04-11T17:17:35","date_gmt":"2019-04-11T16:17:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/?p=20650"},"modified":"2019-04-11T17:17:35","modified_gmt":"2019-04-11T16:17:35","slug":"police-time-is-precious-please-dont-waste-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/2019\/04\/police-time-is-precious-please-dont-waste-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Police time is precious, please don’t waste it."},"content":{"rendered":"
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Police time is critical. It is something that shouldn\u2019t ever be wasted or taken for granted. But frustratingly, this is the case. Too much of the police time is taken up and wasted by the public, whether it be deliberately or not, it\u2019s happening; and you need to be aware.<\/p>\n

As a police call taker, the amount of calls that they receive that are of no relevance to the police is astounding. So many of them are just utter nonsense, that leave you baffled as to what on Earth went through the callers mind to come to the decision that they needed to ring the emergency services (I can\u2019t stress the emergency part enough). To shed some light, here\u2019s a small handful of some of the ridiculous calls the police have had to deal with:<\/p>\n

\u2022 Someone rang to complain about a cow mooing too loudly,<\/p>\n

\u2022 A spider in their room,<\/p>\n

\u2022 A problem with the sprinkles on their ice cream,<\/p>\n

\u2022 Given the wrong type of burger at a fast food restaurant,<\/p>\n

\u2022 And actually quite shockingly, a man rang the police to complain about a prostitutes\u2019 looks.<\/p>\n

Now, although these few examples may seem quite comical, we need to be able to realise how serious an effect these calls can have. Because for every call like these that a police call handler is stuck on, there\u2019s another call waiting that might desperately need the police. Someone who\u2019s just been robbed, a victim of sexual assault, a victim of domestic abuse or violence, somebody with a weapon, a traffic accident. And so much more. But because of calls from perhaps uninformed people, calls of genuine urgency have to wait.<\/p>\n

When it comes to police time being wasted, some of the main causes are drunk people, lonely people, and those with mental health. I believe the police shouldn\u2019t have to deal with and clean up your drunken mistakes \u2013 but it has become part of their responsibility, their cars aren\u2019t taxi cabs, and their cells aren\u2019t hotel rooms to sober up in overnight; don\u2019t you agree? Maybe we should be more responsible with how much we drink considering what sort of state some people get in; but that\u2019s a whole other topic. To put it simply, be responsible, know your limits and look out for each other. Why don\u2019t we do ourselves and the police a favour?<\/p>\n

Today,<\/span> I think that the police force is severely underappreciated for everything that they do. Too many people don\u2019t give them the respect that they deserve for the role they play in society. It isn\u2019t easy. They are constantly faced with all sorts of threats, and too often those threats can somewhat become a reality; in 2016\/17<\/span> there was an estimated 24,000 assaults on officers across all forces with almost 9,000 resulting in injury. Frankly, I think it\u2019s disgusting. I think it\u2019s disgusting that almost every single police officer has been assaulted at least once whilst on the job.<\/p>\n

But it isn\u2019t just physical, the verbal abuse they receive is on another level. And it doesn\u2019t just happen to the officers that are out patrolling on the streets and in cars etc., call handlers often face such abuse; which can make their job unnecessarily much more difficult. It is a lack of respect. A lack of understanding into what they do. Into the hard work they put in often under pressure. Using what resources and capability that they have to try do their very best at their job. At stopping and preventing crime to keep our communities functioning and safe for us.<\/p>\n

Please take the time to visit the official police website www.police.uk<\/a> and have a read of the \u2018Contact the police\u2019 section, to remind yourself and others of when it is appropriate to call 999 or 101.<\/p>\n

This article by Young Reporter, Rachel Coo<\/strong><\/p>\n

First appeared in Grimsby Telegraph on 9th April 2019<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n

\n <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Police time is critical. It is something that shouldn\u2019t ever be wasted or taken for granted. But frustratingly, this is the case. Too much of the police time is taken up and wasted by the public, whether it be deliberately or not, it\u2019s happening; and you need to be aware. Read this week’s article by our Young Reporter Rachel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"xn-wppe-expiration":[],"xn-wppe-expiration-action":[],"xn-wppe-expiration-prefix":[],"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[369,11],"tags":[626],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3cThd-5n4","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20650"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20650"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20652,"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20650\/revisions\/20652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vanel.org.uk\/va\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}