{"id":154549,"date":"2020-11-30T14:59:59","date_gmt":"2020-11-30T14:59:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/?p=154549"},"modified":"2020-11-30T14:59:59","modified_gmt":"2020-11-30T14:59:59","slug":"federation-chair-urges-officers-to-think-before-they-send-on-whatsapp-and-social-media-groups","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/?p=154549","title":{"rendered":"Federation Chair urges officers to think before they send on WhatsApp and social media groups"},"content":{"rendered":"

ESSEX Police Federation Chair Laura Heggie urged officers to think very carefully about what they send on WhatsApp groups and online.<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

Laura said: \u201cSome officers think that they\u2019ve got this right to a private life and as such their WhatsApp groups, their text messages and so on are private.<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen they\u2019re being viewed by other police officers or staff, we\u2019ve all got to remember we\u2019ve all signed up to the code of ethics and\u00a0<\/span>with that\u00a0there\u2019s things that aren\u2019t acceptable. We all have different ways of coping with things that have gone on, and a lot of it\u2019s dealt with by banter and humour within the police. But there\u2019s got to be a line and you can\u2019t overstep it.<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/u><\/u>\u201cIf there is someone that\u2019s starting to overstep the mark, as police officers we\u2019ve all got a responsibility to challenge that.<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really hard because WhatsApp groups are the easiest way, especially with a shift of officers, to keep in touch with everybody and to get information out quickly amongst your team. There is a place for them and there is a need for them, but it\u2019s just monitoring that banter and making sure people aren\u2019t putting their jobs at risk.\u201d<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

The Police Federation of England and Wales recently warned officers not to let social media ruin their career.<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

Tiff Lynch, PFEW Conduct and Performance Secretary, said: \u201cIt\u2019s sadly becoming an all too familiar headline: \u2018Cop sacked over offensive social media post\u2019. What starts out as a private joke, or was even received unsolicited, ends up costing an officer their career.<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

\u201cIn an age where everything is recorded and shared for the goal of\u00a0<\/span>\u201c<\/span>likes\u201d, it is easy to forget that we as cops live by a different set of rules.<\/span><\/u><\/u><\/p>\n

\u201cAs police officers we have a different right to privacy – both on and off duty – as public interest has been used by the courts in order to override it. So, if an officer shares any post which others could perceive as offensive on social media or WhatsApp, there\u2019s the potential for misconduct charges to be brought against them, even if it was on a personal phone or off duty. If an officer receives material which others could perceive as offensive, for example jokes that could be considered racist or sexist, they have a duty to challenge that material. If they don\u2019t, again they could be up on misconduct charges.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ESSEX Police Federation Chair Laura Heggie urged officers to think very carefully about what they send on WhatsApp groups and online. Laura said: \u201cSome officers think that they\u2019ve got this\u2026 read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3408,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154549"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=154549"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154549\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":154680,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154549\/revisions\/154680"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=154549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=154549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=154549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}