“Resilience under microscope after Colchester murders”

TWO recent high profile murders in Colchester have stretched the slimmed down Essex Police force like never before.

Federation chairman Mark Smith (pictured) has written an article for EssexFedFocus that – while praising the police response – also questions how sustainable it is with the cuts to Essex Police.

You can see the full article below/by clicking here.

“I start this article by saying that in response to the Colchester murders there has been a fantastic effort by all Essex Police officers, community support officers, police staff, specials and all officers that came in and helped with mutual aid. It has been policing at its best. It is pulling together with one goal; to catch the person or people responsible for the murders and to reassure the public.

“Officers did this without question. They got on with it. They know it’s our job. They know what the objective is; the objective is to catch the people that have committed these crimes. But the problems that Colchester has caused for the rest of the county I think are immense. They have put a strain onto the force .There isn’t the resilience nowadays. It isn’t sustainable. The force has now started to stand down some of the extra officers and it had to be done.

“We approached the chief constable [Steve Kavanagh] and said this is not sustainable – for a number of reasons. The first reason is the public of Essex – we have a huge number of police officers in Colchester – and rightly so. We have got detectives who are investigating the murders, we have got search officers who are searching a huge scene to try and protect evidence. We have got officers protecting that scene 24/7 – we were looking at 60 odd officers per day to guard the scene. And then we have officers that were drafted in to give high profile patrolling – about 160+ officers per day doing that. And while they are doing these patrols they are not at their normal places of work.

“These resources come from the rest of the county and they are drawn away from local areas where they have their own workloads and crime files. Every crime file has a victim and those victims aren’t being dealt with because those officers aren’t there to deal with it. So yes there is a lot of policing going on in Colchester but the rest of Essex has been suffering because the resourcing isn’t there anymore. We don’t have the frontline officers to deal with this type of job, to this level of resourcing and the remaining jobs around Essex.

“The solution is to stop cutting police budgets.

“It is to invest in policing again. What service do you want to give the public? Because at the moment the Government are not providing the public with the right service. I spoke to the chief directly and asked him, “while we have got Colchester going on, and so many resources there, what happens if we have this style of murder in another part of the county?” How are we going to deal with it? How will we cope?  And I was told by the force, it would be dealt with by mutual aid. This is clearly because we do not have the resources to be able to deal with a number of major jobs and business as normal at the same time anymore. I know in the past we would call on other forces from time to time but it has had to be much quicker this time and the resources aren’t out there. As it happened we did have another murder, in Southend, but arrests were made very quickly. What if the arrests had not been made? Where would the resources have come from?

“Essex Police also have officer welfare to consider – you have to look after your officers’. Officers and staff are the greatest asset the force has. Officers have been on permanent 12 hour shifts for the last three weeks. Rightly so, it is an exigency of duty – our objective is to catch the person or persons for each of these crimes. But, you can’t knock your officers out to get that objective. Because if you do you will have no officers left at a later date to carry on policing.

“In any job it gets to a point where the adrenaline starts to die down, the pace slows down as the investigation continues and people start feeling tired. They remember they have their own workloads back at the station which aren’t being dealt with and they have a home life too. You have to look after your officers and prevent them from burning out. You have to look after the officers who are still covering the rest of Essex and picking up the work load of those policing Colchester, there is still a job to be done elsewhere in the county.

“The cuts – without a doubt – have meant that we haven’t got the resilience to deal with everything.

“Our domestic violence list went to an extremely high level . I don’t think it is as a result of the murder alone – I think they were already going up due to fewer resources and we were struggling to deal with the amount we had on the list anyway. But of course the resourcing needed for the Colchester murders didn’t help. Midway through the murders, on the weekend, the force declared another exigency of duty which we totally disagreed with and challenged the force over. Of course we all agree that the response to the murders was an exigency of duty – but to then call an exigency of duty halfway through that operation to cover business as normal is wrong. We are where we are with business as normal and the ever expanding outstanding lists. We are where we are because of the government cuts. So to bring officers in on their rest days when they are recovering from the long hours worked having already worked some of their rest days is wrong and short sighted. Officers need to recover if they are to be fit for their next duty.

“These are the same officers that are already working 12 hour shifts, have been told by the force that for a month there is going to be no more annual leave accepted, no rest days in lieu to be accepted, no toil to be accepted because of this operation. If you then take away their rest days, the days they need to recover from this operation in Colchester – you are not helping the people of Essex, you are not helping the force and you are not helping the officers’ welfare.

“What makes me sad is that I don’t think there is a solution. It could get worse. If there is another Comprehensive Spending Review and we have already made savings everywhere then we face losing more frontline officers, and the situation will only get worse. And I think it will get worse.

“Other forces helped us out and we help other forces. We requested other forces to send us resources and that is what we did. But is it going to get to a point where other forces say, we are very sorry but we cannot send any help. And maybe we would do likewise. What if another force had a murder and said they need Essex’s help. We would have to say – “we are very sorry but we are tied up. We cannot send anybody.” I think if they keep cutting, it is only going to get worse.

“Essex Officers are doing a fantastic job in challenging times and this needs to be highlighted. This article isn’t a dig at the force. The chief can only police with the budget he has been given. I thank the Chief on behalf of those officers he and others visited over the three weeks

“I want to raise public awareness. I do not say what I say lightly and I do not say it to scare people. I became a police officer to protect and help the public. It is my belief that Government cuts to the policing budgets are leaving Essex Police in a position where its capacity to deal with incidents has been reached and as a result we have issues around resilience and sustainability  when dealing with protracted incidents and business as normal.

“I think our resourcing levels are at breaking point.”