rebrand police community support officers in South Yorkshire

[millsy]

We have 7 wards, 7 ward PC's and 14 PCSO's making up 2-1 per ward, the PC's are now used in a small 'task force' away from the ward duties really whereas we the PCSO's are becoming the first point of contact. We now run all the PACT meetings, surgeries, council meetings, resident assoc. meetings, ASB calls, databases etc etc

[Minx]

Once again I feel that I am obliged to say that it is a sad indictment of the way policing seems to being sent.
However, in my Local Policing Area the inspectors and Super. are very hot on sending EVERYONE out on patrol at "Red Times". To be fair most of our PCs are more than willing to be in their communities but sadly here in D&C a project called Blueprint was brought in to restructure the way policing is organised. It was meant to be an improvement, but everyone, including those involved in the implementation have been forced to admit that it has failed the public. It meant that all PCs including neighbourhood officers were to carry out "Secondary Response" duties on 2 of the 5 weeks of their rotas. These duties are based around taking up the slack for Response and performing the patrols around nightclubs and dealing with the "Nighttime Economy"! This not only takes them out of the neighbourhooods physically but also means that they have to spend extra time behind a computer catching up on the related paperwork.

Now the powers-that-be have openly declared that PCSOs are the primary beat officers and that the neighbourhood officers are "problem solvers"!!!

I apologise for all the "" but our force is now existing on them!

[lookalikecop]

Its the same everywhere, pcsos do the work catch the crims and the officers take the praise... Whos job is up For the chop??? We the pcso, all i can say is good luck to them, no foot beat no intel no knowing the local crims no friendly face for the local residents anymore. What a sorry state we are in!

[Marlon]

Its the same everywhere, pcsos do the work catch the crims and the officers take the praise...

no intel

no knowing the local crims

no friendly face for the local residents

I don't accept any of the above as true, IME.

[megablastic]

Wow you guys really like to 'us' and 'them' don't you?

2 very different jobs, not all full officers are lazy.

[ninjamonk]

I have to say where i am Pc's and Pcso's work really well together.

[jay1]

same here
one big happy family

[RINGER]

I don't really get why this is big news - has been the case in my force for around 2 years now - PC's have been withdrawn from the Local Policing Teams, and pcso's are now the 'beat managers'. A good thing in a sense really, as we're proving our worth that we don't need PC's to hold our hands for the day to day stuff. What does concern me is that on a team that used to have around 14 staff for 5 wards, we now have 3 PCSO's (including me) and our skipper. Workload has gone through the roof and it is becoming an increasing struggle to keep the local knowledge up to date. That said, we are somehow just about coping at the moment!

As for 'PCSO's doing the work and officers taking the praise', that certainly wasn't the case when I received a thank you email from the response team skipper for detaining a prolific TFMV offender a few weeks ago, which he was kind enough to copy in my Ch Insp... Sounds like someone's a teeny bit bitter.

[arthurgray50@blu]

I have read this thread with great enthusiasm, they are trying to do this in the Met, it is causing us lots of problems, we are going to get paid more money but have to work extra hours to achieve it and our ref break will remain the same - 45 minutes.

As l neighbourhood officer, we need more officers out there on the street, more PCs also, but the Met is being stretched to the limit and all this government want to do is place more pressure on every member of the 'family', l feel sad for every PCSO in all forces that we have to put up with people that sit behind a desk and telling officers on the street that we need' figures'

The PCSO's work very hard to achieve goals for there forces, but federations think that we are PCs on the cheap, i have been associated with the force for nearly 20 years, l was a special before and saw what happens on a daily basis. we are the ' eyes and ears' of the community, l get called 'plastic' on a daily basis, we are told that we now need a 'witness' for PNDS.

Recently, it was stated that the coalition was going to scrap us, as they wanted warranted officers on the street, makes me laugh as can you see a PC going round doing a welfare check on an OAP or when was the last time on the PR you heard loads of units going to a domestic - yet someone trying to rob a bank or try to kill someone, then you get four units call up at the same time.

My belief is that PCSO's should be left to do there great job and that is 'COMMUNITY SUPPORT' l can honestly see that the government will bring in private companies to run us, to save money.

[JimmyRiddle]

The we are told that we now need a 'witness' for PNDS.

This is a misconception. A PC needs an MoP witness for a S5 POA (ONLY) as he/she cannot be harassed/alarmed/distressed as per DPP vs Orum 1998.

A PCSO on the otherhand, doesn't need anyone but him/herself as a PCSO is not a Constable and therefore can be H/A/D'd. I find it unusual many forces have given their PCSOs the PND powers, as these are all crimed. If I had the power to do PNDs, I'd be doing loads just through the area I work. And no, I don't speak to people like shiz or wind people up before any smarties start saying anything.