“I won’t have the police service as the place where all of society’s ills are laid out and blamed on us.” (Cressida Dick, Met Police Commissioner, April 2017)

The painful privilege of policing is to venture into the hurting places – and to encounter the lives being lived there: the damaged and the dangerous, the beaten and the broken, the troubled and the terrified, the abandoned and the afraid.

I’ve said it often before, but it bears repeating: police officers go where most wouldn’t and do what most couldn’t. I’m incredibly proud of the fact that they do.

But we expect an extraordinary amount from them:

• We expect them to respond when we call
• We expect them to come quickly and arrive safely
• We expect them to to provide emergency medical treatment in the minutes before the ambulance arrives
• We expect them to be able to use a defibrillator
• We expect them to face violence with steady hearts and hands
• We expect them to face abuse with an even temper
• We expect them to show restraint
• We expect them to preserve...
  
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Last week, PC Keith Palmer gave his life protecting this city that is my home.

He was a husband. He was a dad. He was a police officer. And he was a thousand other things besides. I never had the privilege of knowing him – but I know what he was. ‘Hero’ barely even begins to cover it.

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I didn’t actually know any Coppers before I joined the Met almost 25 years ago. Not a single one.

I knew about them of course: I saw them out on patrol; I watched them on TV; I got told off by one of them once for something I hadn’t done.

But I didn’t actually know any of them – what they were like; what made them tick. They were inhabitants of a world beyond my experience and understanding. That’s how it remains for most of us.

These days, I’m proud to count any number of them as friends. And I want you to know that the finest of them are as fine as people can be.

They are brave

Dear God, they are brave.

They are the headlong rush of blues and twos: the first to the scene; the first to the chase; the first to confront; the...

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“Urgent Assistance”.

Two highly emotive words – instantly recognisable to police officers everywhere.

It’s a distress call.

It’s the distress call: the one radio transmission guaranteed to cut through the relentless background noise – to prompt any Copper within travelling distance (and some much further away) to drop whatever they’re doing and get to a colleague in trouble as fast as they can.

It’s a very powerful thing.

Earlier today, I posted a simple Tweet:

That’s when the responses from police officers & staff – both serving and retired – started to come in. They offer an extraordinary insight into the working lives of the women & men who stand on the Thin Blue Line.

Here’s what they wrote:

@Supt_IanDS: almost 20 yrs ago, but recall it like it was yesterday!

@BriW74: 13 years ago at Charing Cross railway station. A rather large man had me on the floor and was using my head as a football.

@GrumblingCop: Man swinging sock with snooker ball in it at my head. Rather old-school weapon.

@WYP_1999HARMAN: The noise the radio...

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So much of the current talk in policing is of change.

Of the pressing need for reform.

And, truth be told, there is a great deal in this job that needs sorting out.

But, amongst all the conversations about things like modernisation and transformation, it seems to me that we’re in danger of missing something of fundamental importance.

Where is the talk about all that is precious in policing?

About the things that must never change? About the things you cannot put a price on, but that we cannot afford to be without?

Things like…

(1) The simple desire to make a difference

Ask most good Coppers why they joined and the answer will be a simple one. They just wanted to make a difference.

They still do.

It was never about money or status, recognition or reward. It was just about changing the world, one life at a time.

It still is.

(2) The privilege of public service

As the old wisdom suggests, ‘whoever wants to become great among you, must be your servant…’

That precious and old fashioned thing called duty. That willingness to spend...

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I have a birthday this week. Not an especially significant one but, nonetheless, a prompt to pause and think for just a moment or two.  About work. About life. About the things that really matter.

Almost 47 years of life. Almost 25 years of policing.

And there are some things I’ve been learning along the way.

It’s People Stupid

I won’t tire of repeating this one.

People matter more than anything else. Those we serve and those we serve alongside.

People matter more than performance charts. They matter more than meetings. They matter more than deadlines – more than yesterday’s headlines. This Job is all about people. And they simply have to matter more.

Every contact leaves a trace.

Courage is not the Absence of Fear

You come across some astonishingly brave people in this line of work: men and women who have risked everything for the sake of both friends and strangers.

Then there are those who have paid the greatest price of all.

And here’s the thing. None of them was unafraid. But they responded to something that lies...

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This week sees the final interviews for the job of Met Commissioner. There are some truly outstanding people in the running.

And what awaits the successful candidate? Simply, the honour and responsibility of leading the finest police service in the world. The Met has its faults and failings of course – some of them grave – but it remains an extraordinary institution.

More than the institution though, there are the people – as fine a group of women and men as you could ever hope to meet. Some of them fall short, but most of them are about as remarkable as people can be: the everyday heroes and heroines who police our streets. It seems to me that serving them is the greatest leadership privilege of all.

The new Boss is going to arrive to a set of eye-watering challenges – a combination of operational and organisational demands the like of which policing has not seen in a generation and more. And they are not unique to London – policing the length and breadth of the country is feeling the strain.

I’ve written before...

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