Force To Axe 150 Beat Police Officers

The report force is to axe 150 beat police published on BBC News is now being discussed in the police forum.

In a thread titled and so it begins... a number of police forum members are hotly debating whether this was the Government's community policing / PCSO masterplan.

"This government and their targets. It is only recently that forces were compelled to put around 70% of their Officers onto neighbourhood teams; now, within a matter of months, these very same Officers are being re deployed to battle yet another priority of the moment.
It makes you wonder if this wasn't a ploy from the outset - ie, Neighbourhood Policing actually being a platform for more PCSOs."

But Roy Farmer of the Police Federation said they (PCSOs) could not replace police officers.

"They are not equipped to do a police officer's role. They don't have the full training that a police officer has over two years, and then on and on through his career."

Devon and Cornwall Police would not comment on the proposal but said community support officers were proving a success by tackling anti-social behaviour, low-level crime and reducing the fear of crime.