Thoughts from the backseat

Disclaimer: I have not been asked to write this, nor has it been seen or approved by the Met Police.

In March of this year, after invitation from a sergeant, I went for a Sunday, late-turn (2-11pm) ride-along with his section around Brixton, London.  Up until then, I’d only been on ride-alongs with my local service, Devon and Cornwall, and looked forward to observing the similarities and differences in what they policed and how.  

The first surprise was to get into the Incident Response Vehicle (IRV) and be met by three officers; a stark contrast to the single crew I was used to in our rural service.  It was a young team; two men and one woman with a mix of personalities, but lots of laughs and some dodgy karaoke throughout the shift (which thankfully never made it on to Body Worn Video), but no sooner had we signed on, we were off on Blues and Twos (lights and sirens), our response being so quick, I didn’t even know what the job was.

When we turned up, we were one of three cars; two marked, one unmarked with around 12 officers in total, including an armed response vehicle (ARV) with authorised firearm officers (AFO).  There was one young, skinny man stood on the pavement, handcuffed to the rear with officers, questioning him of the whereabouts of the other, alleged assailant.  The young man was university-age but calm and respectful, often answering questions with “Sir” at the end; he knew the protocol, it seemed.  To the untrained eye and ear, our response appeared over the top; something, an elderly man stood watching us highlighted, until one of the officers replied that we were responding to calls of “two young men wielding machetes,” (we never found the weapon in question or the other assailant) but both perspectives had been simultaneously right.  The number of us did look disproportionate to the young, skinny and compliant man but operationally, our response was entirely proportionate, and it immediately highlighted to me the continual disconnect the general public have in its understanding of the realities of policing, and why ride alongs should be mandatory for great swathes of the population, especially “armchair experts” against (often) edited social media clips.

We then got a call to a group of young people causing problems outside a convenience store so, off we were again at high speed, weaving in an out of traffic along the busy Brixton Hill Road when I suddenly noticed a man lying on the pavement by a pedestrian crossing, not moving.  None of the officers had spotted him (proving that they’re just as human as the rest of us and can miss things) so, as we were on route to a job, they called CCTV to check him out, as I gave a description of him.  By the time we got to the store (in under five minutes), we were stood down so our driver said we’d go back to check on the pavement guy.  I had never been to Brixton before and had no idea of its geography etc., but suddenly my driver was asking which junction I’d spotted the man at. “Right, right”, I responded as we drove parallel to Brixton Hill to work out where to come out.  It’s become a bit of a running joke to my civilian friends that I now spend so much of my time working with police, my vocabulary has changed and find myself using police terms without awareness of it; I’ve lovingly been told, more than once, that I need to “get a life”. Thankfully I was right, but by the time we pulled up to the junction, I recognised that my description of the man’s clothes had been substantially off, highlighting just how unreliable eye witness accounts can be, especially when the adrenaline is pumping.  The man was fine; just incredibly drunk with no injuries, so we left him to it and went on to the next job but I was thankful that my navigational skills were better than my observational ones!  

It was “game on” in the car after this; my officers now realised I was valuable to them; that I knew police practices, terminology and that I could give as good as I got with banter, so they started to include me as the jobs came in.  Look out for a particular vehicle or registration (“because you’re good at spotting things”), hand me the computer to look at a photo of a suicidal, missing woman to keep an eye out for; listen to the radio for comms chatter when they were out of the car.  I may not have been wearing a uniform but I was (proudly) made to feel one of the team.  

We got called to an apartment block where a “gang of youths” were causing criminal damage and as soon as we began to walk the halls looking for them, residents opened their doors to complain that they felt “hostages” in their own homes because “nothing was being done”.  We never found the youths in question, though could see the trail of destruction they’d left, and I left feeling frustrated that we had done nothing to help the residents in their immediacy but also that partner agencies didn’t appear to be getting anywhere either, given what the residents briefly told us.  

We did, however, catch up with another group of young people who were in a place they shouldn’t have been.  Several school-age children (11/12 years old) were trespassing and as soon as they saw us, reality set in for them.  They were terrified they were going to get in trouble with their parents and us but they were compliant, respectful and apologetic when officers explained why they were being spoken to.  I don’t believe anyone should be afraid of the police (though I understand why some are); I hate the script that many parents tell their children that if they don’t stop misbehaving “police will arrest them” which does nothing to foster good relationships between police and wider society.  But it gave me hope that some young people did still respect authority when it was presented and instilled a little fear (which we all need at times) of consequences for our actions.  

Toward the end of my shift, it was clear that at least three of our calls had been as a result of “Not-my-remit” tennis; businesses and other agencies playing the system to get the police involved.  The youths at the convenience store hadn’t been causing problems; the size of their group had merely worried the store owner.  We got called to a restaurant to deal with a homeless man camped outside threatening customers, but it became clear that there had been no real threats, the business just wanted him moved on.  We searched for a missing person on another police services’ patch because they “couldn’t deal with it” despite the officers highlighting this was a regular occurrence between them and the other service.  

One of our jobs was to reports of a man dealing drugs out of his car in a residential street.  A marked car drove by the suspect’s vehicle, reporting there were no occupants inside, but on second inspection realised that the driver had merely reclined his seat all the way back; an easy cake fine for the team to enjoy when he paid up. We could smell the car before we even left our vehicles and as the driver was searched, I watched his vehicle being searched; it felt as if every nook and cranny was filled with either drugs (predominantly weed but also a few wraps of cocaine) or large wads of money (I think we’d all welcome a car full of the latter; legally, of course).  The real shock of the search however, came to us all when we found a Kinder Surprise on the backseat and discovered it actually still had a toy in it which prompted a few, nervous laughs!  If you know, you know and if you don’t, you don’t want to.  

But my biggest takeaway from the night was that, despite being IRV (therefore expected to be the first at incidents) and near-constantly busy, we had lots of opportunities for proactive policing.  The time and resources for our officers to use their “coppers’ nose” to proactively stop vehicles, whether it was a young man on a moped, due to a rise in moped thefts and use of them in crimes (named Operation Venice in the Met), to vehicles where the number plate and car they were attached to didn’t seem to match for them.  It was fascinating to ask the officers what intrigued them about certain vehicles or they way they were driven.

One thing that sadly stuck with me throughout the shift, and many days after, was that I had lost count of the amount of times I had heard the phrase “commit suicide” said over comms (which also spoke to just how many mental health-related calls, police receive), which frustrated me more and more throughout the shift.  No one can “commit” suicide anymore; it was decriminalised by the 1961 Suicide Act and the term does nothing but maintain the stigma that suicide is something to be ashamed of.  The Samaritans urges against using this term and though it’s a small (and therefore, arguably insignificant) change, it is extremely important given that policing is a constantly modernising organisation and one founded on the accuracy of laws and facts.  The terms “die by suicide” or “kill themselves” are less stigmatising and use no more syllables than “commit suicide” if nothing else, so I’d like to see the organisation adopt a new terminology around this particular call/issue.  

In the days after my shift, people asked me how I found it and though it was an extremely varied shift, I would always find myself laughing that it felt as if we had spent most of the night doing 60+ mph into oncoming traffic on Blues and Twos.  There’s nothing quite like looking at your drivers’ speedometer, clocking 72mph on lights and sirens, weaving through oncoming traffic in one of the busiest districts in London to keep you wide awake with adrenaline!  We spent so much of our shift driving at speed to jobs that, at one point, I didn’t even realise we had been part of a Tactical Pursuit and Containment (TPAC) manoeuvre (boxed the car in at a junction) until we all decanted.  At which point my driver thought it hilarious to introduce me to colleagues with the information that we needed to leave the scene quick-sharp because I needed a “wee-wee”.  Safe to say that personal boundaries had gone right out the window as soon as I got in the car for the start of my shift, it had seemed!  

We did briefly (whilst stood at the junction), however, discuss my immediate observations about the differences in Devon and Cornwall versus the Met and as soon as I mentioned many (in D&C) were single-crewed, the officers replied they’d “never do that”.  This coming from officers who police our capital with the highest threat risk, highlighting the inherent danger in the practice even if it is unavoidable in some sections and services.

And yet, I realised when seeing the look of surprise on the faces of (civilian) friends I’d shared the speed with that, at no point had I been scared, despite the inherent risk of driving the speeds and ways in which we had; I felt incredibly safe even when everything in my body told me I shouldn’t be.  The skill of my driver were second to none and I wouldn’t hesitate to be in his car again or go out on shift with any of them, which I’ve thankfully been invited to do.  It still dumfounds me (and everyone I share it with) that police drivers can be prosecuted as civilians if they have collisions, and that no consideration is given to the incredible depth of training they receive to do their job.  

At the end of our shift, they dropped me back to the tube station and on my train home, I felt full of pride for those in my car and the organisation as a whole but a sting of bittersweetness, recognising how effortless the night felt for me.  How easily I fit in, both with my officers who quickly realised that I was far more informed than they suspected I would be, and knowing that I couldn’t just do the job but that I could do it well and would bring so much to it.  My entire journey with police began when I applied to become a Special but I withdrew my application when I realised that supporting my officers became more important to me than becoming one. I’ve always known I would become Job at some point and I know I would be that job-pissed response driver or AFO but for many, many reasons, I don’t feel able to join; at least, not right now.  Whatever I thought of the organisation before I connected with its wellbeing discussion, it’s not what I think of it now; but this anti-police narrative, fuelled by everyone from local and national media through to government officials, needs to stop because it’s eroding the foundation on which policing was built.  

That’s not to say that police don’t deserve criticism and shouldn’t be challenged where and when appropriate; I’ve just published a book about my negative experience of reporting rape and reflecting on the criminal justice system around sexual offences (though still defended the police within it).  But if the “police are the public and the public are the police” (as Robert Peel wished when he created the foundation of the organisation), it would behove the general public to educate themselves on police practices before it condemns them from the safety of their comfortably privileged armchairs.  

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