I suppose my first true post should be about, well, PCSO's.

I know PCSO's are controversial. We've received a disproportionate amount of criticism in the press. Some may be justified, but overall it is disproportionate.

Judging from my experience of the fallout from the negative press coverage, the great British public seem unable to distinguish between subjective and objective "evidence". Unable to tell the difference between opinion and fact and seem unable to filter out the inflammatory, emotive language used to manipulate readers opinions. Because of this, we’ve arrived at a situation where the majority of the public have no idea what PCSO's really are. They don’t know what we can or can't do, and generally think we're Walter Mitty characters who joined so we could be paid to be nosey and bossy.

I'm not going to pretend that PCSO's are the solution to everything wrong with modern policing, but by explaining my view on the role I just might be able to sway a few people's opinions.

As I see it there are three main "strands" to our role:

1) Policing by supporting the work of Constables and shouldering some of their burden. This includes general police duties that don't require the power of arrest such as house to house enquiries, crime scene preservation, cordons and road blocks, welfare checks, school visits, dealing with minor anti-social behaviour, mediating neighbour disputes etc, etc.

2) Community Focus through working on a specific neighbourhood. We provide a constant contact to residents on our beat area, allowing us to build a relationship between the police and a community and help engender trust. We are in a position to gather intelligence and gain a detailed understanding of issues in the community.

3) High Visibility Reassurance. Because we don’t have the paperwork that comes with the powers of a Constable we have the time to be out and about on the area, providing a visible uniformed presence on the street. This reduces the fear of crime and reassures the local community and deters offenders.

(This is a simplification of the PCSO role, it’s my opinion and some other PCSO’s may disagree.)

That’s the theory anyway.

The first point I agree with. Constables are expensive. As a tax payer I don’t want to pay for a highly trained, highly qualified Constable so they can spend their time guarding a crime scene. I don’t want them being sent to deal with Mrs Miggins who thinks that parents should be sent to jail for allowing their kids to play football in a cul-de-sac, while a cash point robbery goes un-resourced. This makes sense to me, why can’t we deal with these low level incidents and tasks in a cost efficient way? It frees up resources, both human and financial, for use elsewhere. The majority of Constables I work with feel the same (even if they won’t admit it). The phrase “Is a PCSO not free to deal with that?” is heard quite a lot on the radio, and there’s almost always a frustrated sounding “Roger” when the control room says no.

The second point I also agree with. People like the fact they can just drop me an e-mail to let me know they want to chat about something on the area. The alternative is to spend ages trying to get through to the call centre, trying to explain the problem to someone who doesn’t know the area, and then it being dealt with by an officer who doesn’t know the area, is different to the officer that was sent last time and generally has better things to do. It’s also an excellent opportunity to gather intelligence. In my division around 80% of intelligence forms are submitted by PCSO’s. Being dedicated to an area also means we can tackle the root of problems. Rather than treating problems as a series of isolated incidents, we can identify “hot spots” and solve them in the long term. If you’ve ever seen where the problem teenagers on your area are buying their alcohol and thought “Someone should do something about that” then speak to your local PCSO. If you’ve reported motorbikes riding on a footpath loads of times and thought “Why don’t they just put a chicane on it?” then speak to your local PCSO.

The third point about being a high visibility reassurance I... don’t agree with *gasp*. We may reassure a few people or deter some crime but not the majority. We don’t have the powers to deal with crime. How can we reassure people that the police are out and about on the streets dealing with crime when we just can’t deal with crime? If we walk around a corner and are faced with a street fight, burglary in progress or any other ‘real’ crime then there’s not much we can do. Yes, we can “observe and report” or call a constable, but so can a member of the public. Using PCSO’s in this way is a bluff (in my opinion). The public know this, and feel patronised by a government who thinks that a hi-vis jacket is enough to make people feel safe. And that feeling safe is more important than making sure they actually are safe. Hi-vis jackets don’t reassure people, officers with big sticks, handcuffs and integrity reassure people, while at the same time making sure they actually are safe.

I know it’s controversial for a PCSO to disagree with a fundamental aspect of the role and probably the main reason the role was created. I feel that PCSOs can still contribute significantly towards policing by supporting Constables and working with a local community. That’s why I’m a PCSO and enjoy it. What I don’t like is being used to trick the public into thinking everything’s alright because I’m walking down their street with a police radio. We’re not a replacement for Constables and the government shouldn’t pretend otherwise.

So what’s the solution? I don’t think it’s getting rid of PCSOs. PCSOs offer a value for money solution to local community issues, things that were below the attention of the police and went unchallenged before PCSOs came along.

If we were designated with all the powers available to us in legislation then things may be different. If I could issue PNDs for the full range of offences, detain with force and carry handcuffs and PAVA spray (all powers that can currently be designated to PCSOs if the Chief Constable chooses to do so) then I could still fulfil the first two points, while at the same time providing a real deterrent and reassurance without picking up rafts of extra paperwork and becoming station bound.

It may not be a well structured argument, more of a rant really. But that’s my tuppence worth on PCSOs without going into the fallacy of the “omni-competant Constable” or the “non-confrontational” nature of our role. That’s for another post...