Seventy police officers are attacked every day

Using Freedom of Information requests the above statistics are revealed in a report prepared by Tory MP Grant Shapps.  Speaking to ConservativeHome, Grant said:

"My report highlights how the very people who are charged with protecting the public are themselves under constant attack. That seventy Police Officers are attacked every day says much about society and whereas the standard response would be a plethora of new Government initiatives, programmes and prescriptive Whitehall driven targets, I hope that the Home Office uses this investigation to think about these problems from a more long-term perspective."

Embracing David Cameron's focus on the social roots of incivility he continued:

"The answer is to work to heal the deep problems in society, to work out why it is that respect for the police has sunk to the level where it's acceptable to assault the police. Government needs to realise that passing another fifty Home Office Acts of Parliament, will do little to fix the problem. We need to work on mending society through helping families stay together and changing attitudes, every bit as much as simply providing our police with more body armour."

The report is covered in this morning's Express and Telegraph. 

Comments

[Torygirl]

One problem is that on the TV we have programmes on the police where youngsters are often shown cheeking them and the police unable to react. When I was young, we looked up to the police, teachers and our parents, the kids of today have lost all respect since they discovered their "rights".

[Denis Cooper]

I know that some people will disagree about this, but because police officers
are in the front line and therefore at greater risk than most of us I believe they should be given a greater degree of legal protection.

Eg under the Homicide Act 1957 the murder of a police officer remained one
of the cases where the death penalty could be applied:

"Murder committed in the course of or in furtherance of theft; in resisting or avoiding arrest or escaping from legal custody; murder of police officers or
prison officers or persons assisting them; and murder by shooting or causing explosions."

I'd rather see the law provide for harsher deterrent sentences for those found guilty of attacking a police officer than for perpetrators of "racially aggravated" assaults, which are less frequent. The first would be based on sound practical reasoning, while the second was only introduced for ideological reasons.

[Chris]

PCSOs in particular are increasingly vulnerable due to their lack of power. They need to either be given more authority to act, or the scheme should be done away with altogether in favour of hiring more fully trained police officers.

[George Hinton]

A demonstration of the loss of values that this country is experiencing.
Perhaps allowing coppers to be more assertive in enforcing real laws would help, rather than the nanny state we have at present. Criminals seen to have all the cards, leaving plod helpless and stranded, and at the mercy of unscrupulous lawyers, who can use the paper trail to find a technical out for the crim.
A change is needed, less PC policing, more applied policing, more plod on the ground, not in offices filling out forms. We want committed officers not quota fillers.
These basic changes will not be achieved whilst NuLab is still in office, BUT, will DC have the gumption for change.

[Adam]

PCSOs DO have power. They have the same Common Law powers conferred to all of her Majesty's citizens to maintain order and preserve the peace.

[Angelo Basu]

Isn't assaulting a Police officer in the course of their conducting their duties already categorised as an aggravated form of assault?

Can anyone link the actual report so that we can understand what is meant by assault in terms of the statistics being discussed? Having close family in the Police I know that assaults are a serious issue but the report is meaningless without having more information.

Eg if I were to run up behind a PC in the street and shout "Oi Wanker!" that could technically constitute common assault. While such behaviour would not fit with appropriate standards of behaviour in a civil society, it is also not really something to get overly excited about. On the other hand, I know that just in the course of a resisted arrest, police officers face assault through the resistance but few if any PCs would constitute such resistance as an assault on their persons other than in the most serious instances (although this might in part be due to not wishing to complete the paperwork to pursue an assault charge). Again, resisting arrest is not something to be condoned, but it must surely be a myth confined to Camberwick Green (prior to its being co-opted in the second series of Life on Mars!) that criminals ever as a class tended to come quietly.