How much trust do you have in the police
 

How much trust do you have in the police?
have you seen any examples of the police not being a 100% truthful?

have you ever witnessed the police acting out side of their duty?

A lot of trust

i don't have a lot of trust in the police, you can have bad people working as police men and women.
the police are just humans doing a job, not all of them are good at it.

..yeah, I agree but I think to not have a lot of trust in them is dismissing that there is a lot of good because for me, humans are more good than bad...and obviously, if people had a bad personal experience or personally know of one/some then that would effect their judgement...but I think it's like, say if it was a doctor/surgeon that you needed...because you may have no choice but to believe in that person at that particular time, then that's what you do..or a paramedic that you had no choice but to trust..?..a fireman..?..whatever you need and is vital to you at the time....and most of the time, it's a good outcome..(if a good outcome is possible..)...and the police have often 'saved' people/helped people who desperately needed them at the time...

i agree in parts, there are many good police men and women in the police force, but from what i have seen first hand, there are also some bad ones that misuse their powers and cover up their mistakes.

we should never be afraid to question what is being said or done.

..yeah, of course there are bad ones but for me, it's a thing of still believing in them while not being 'delusional' that they're perfect ....

of course, don't get me wrong we need the police, but from being out with serving police that are off duty in the past and being on the other side of the fence, you get to see a different side.

Too many bad experiences with dickheads that has twins my image of them all unfortunately.

..yeah, I think we've had a similar thread before and I know you have some really disturbing stories, I still believe in the police force for all the people they help but I think it's also really important to realise that there are some extremely prejudiced/aggressive members of the force, dreadfully abusing their position and authority...

There's good and bad in every profession but in general I would say they do a great job and I have a lot of trust in them. It's not an easy job either and not everyone could do it

I personally have never had any bad experiences with the police and think most of them are just doing their best in a difficult job, would say we have a lot more trustworthy police force than most other countries as well even in the developed world

I can see why a lot of people don't though and there's been quite a few things recently which will have decreased trust in the force as a whole; all the stuff that's come out about Hillsborough, what happened in the Stephen Lawrence case, the Jean Charles de Menezes shooting, the Mark Duggan shooting, and most recently the Andrew Mitchell plebgate stuff. It seems they have been guilty of fabricating or meddling with key evidence on quite a few occasions, I read quite a good article on it about a month back: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukne...r-anarchy.html

Dont like them. I think they are recruiting the wrong kind of people and too many people make excuses for them.

There are rotten apples in the barrel granted, I have the greatest respect for all public services.
Then again I'm not a criminal or a politician with an agenda am I?
The police were for years used as militia by conservative governments and referred to as a 'police force' a tool of the state, during the Brixton and Toxteth riots, Hillsboro, the miners strike, and the Stephen Laurence murder.
What happens when the police no longer wish to be part of the political strategy?..... They get discredited, set up and set on.
However the 'police service' that most of us experience in our communities is invaluable.

Thats an excellent article. Seems police corruption is more prevalent than people think. I liked that they pointed out Andrew Mitchell had the means to get amazing assistance in clearing his name but someone from a council estate with no great connections would never be taken seriously. And, even more disturbing, the police involved received no disciplinary action.

99% of them are great. A lot of them are dickheads, but I would take the police dickheads over the criminal dickheads

That article is the biggest load of tory spin I have ever had the misfortune to read.
How unfair is parliamentary privilege?... the abuse, corruption, fraud and lies perpetuated against the police over the years?
The 30yr rule proved it wasn't the police that were responsible for failings in many high profile cases but senior politicians.
The suffering of sexual abuse victims associated with past government officials, Cyril Smith and maggies mate Savile?
Were the police at fault in their investigations?... No because there were no investigations.
Plebgate has done just what was expected and shook the confidence that middle england had in the police, they can lie but only when they are ordered to....
'Know your place!'
Those words will be ringing in everyones ears for generations.

I haven't had any bad experiences with the police. I trust them quite a bit yeah but they're just people doing a job so they're gonna stuff up now and again.

I have no doubt all that is true but I thought we were discussing the police?

We are, you have to look at the bigger picture though don't you?
Otherwise you end up wirh a cockeyed perception of the truth.
The establishment are answerable, it appears to be a political decision as to what they are answerable for.
They also have to be held accountable, although if their hands are tied on issues that have political connotations that seems unfair as far as I can see.
We are discussing the police but the two are inextricably linked.

I'm aware of that but thank you for enlightening me. :thumbs:

On another day we can discuss the link between Politics and the police but in this thread I thought we were discussing how much we trust the police?

Our own Gardai are a lot more straight forward and kind of have a more simplistic past than your Police over there.

They're generally fine, decent people but there is a complete lack of trust in this country not in their character but their effectiveness. They are seen almost as a half arsed, fairy kind of community watch outfit and not a force with any sort of force whatsoever. They're relentlessly caricatured as being kind of dim country bumpkin sorts.

In short people don't really call them out. You're more likely to call a Garda out for some trivial thing like your neighbor parking in your space than you are for an actual bit of drama like some guy with a knife shooting on down the road. You call your friends for that sort of thing and have a gossip about it.

But I've always kind of thought of them as nice blokes and beneath all the fun it is to make fun of them when I'm walking home properly blotto on my own and I see them about I'm glad.

That never happens though. Because barely any of them ever seem to be about. Oh yeah we're also incredibly sexist towards the female ones. It's actually shocking. They're seen as pretend.

Don't patronise me please, I would rather you didn't dictate the content of my posts either.
If you don't want to debate the specifics of my opinion don't quote me.

WHy did you quote me in the first place? I didnt provide the initial link to the article.

I didn't say you had, I quoted you as I had a different perspective to your interpretation of it is all.
I didn't tell you what you could or couldn't add to the debate iirc.

How nice of you but if you want that discussion that have it with whoever supplied the initial link. I thought we were discussing the police in this thread.

I have complete trust in the police, but then I'm a white woman.

you would be a fool to ever trust the cops.

yeah... I'm not a fool.

Only a fool would suggest one branch of the authoritative power in the UK could be considered corrupt but refuse to acknowledge others are too.

You're just saying that because it's a Telegraph article, what is specifically Tory about it? Not sure what a lot of this post has to do with the article, it was hardly holding up the political establishment over the police, he even says that parliament is one of the institutions that has gone very wrong and says that his sympathy with Mitchell is limited because he was fortunate enough to be rich and had the backing of several influential friends, a luxury he wouldn't have had if he wasn't a politician

I think you either didn't read the article fully or missed the point of it

I most certainly did read the article, in particular the part that said that Andrew Michell is a 'close friend' of those involved in the paper.
That doesn't automatically suggest that anyone without influence has to be wary of the police, that feeds the myth that this is endemic.
I think the whole Mitchell situation stinks to high heaven, a don't doubt for one moment that he didn't say 'pleb' 'know your place' or swear his head off.
The fact that this has been swirling around so much during a time of acute social and economic pressure is sickening.
It's as far as I can see irreconcilably damaged public perception of the police, and set public relations back decades.
In this social climate is that wise?
Was that the plan, to damage the police as they have the NHS?
I think it was, I'm certain it was!

:joker:

A close friend of one journalist from the paper, that's all. It is a fact that at best three police officers lied about what happened and it might even have been worse than that, these were the findings of the IPCC not any politicians or journalists that were close to Mitchell.

Oborne's point is that for the police to be effective they need to be trusted by the public, something that won't happen if they are shown to have lied and gotten away with it, as they have done in other incidents as well. They're in a position where they have the power of arrest, are tasked with gathering evidence, and are generally given greater credence and special protections. Hence why they need to be held to such a high standard. With so many questionable incidents in recent years the police force should be scrutinised in the same way that MPs were after expenses, journalists after phone hacking, bankers after the recession and the intelligence services after Iraq. Seems a sensible idea to me.

The fact is nobody knows what was said for certain as mitchell won't express honestly what he did say will he, yes he is a friend of this journalist... funny that and he gets to help ruin the reputation of hard working officers up and down the country.
The government have been pivotal in ensuring that the country have NO faith in the police, and it's rather hypocritical of a government who the public have no faith in to ask that in all fairness.
As you mention expenses lets run with that, have we really had a full an frank explanation as to the implamentations to restrict further abuses?
Similarly with lobbying,the dubious business practices and alliances with despots.
That's not even taking into account Cameron and Brooks, Patton and the BBC and the obvious bias of the Mail run by a fascist.

No, not this journalist. A completely different journalist. Oborne has no relationship with Mitchell, originally sympathised with the police in this case, and even now doesn't care that much about Mitchell.

It's a shame that a lot of genuine police officers might now not be trusted but the responsibility for that lies with those members of the police who brought the force into disrepute. We might not know for certain what Mitchell said but we can go on the findings and research of an independent body as well as evidence that was uncovered by C4, and it doesn't reflect well on the police at all. Not that this is just about Mitchell, as the article also says there's been so many cases of questionable action by the police that in reality they were lacking a lot of peoples trust anyway

I am very pro the Police, I accept some do wrong as they go about their jobs but overall I trust them and support them.

Don't you think Osbornes connections could be used to help his colleague?... I do.
We don't know what was said that is the first fact we have, it is unsure why C4 felt the need to get involved in this isn't it?
When there was so many officers, independent bodies and government agencies involved too.
I appreciate that it states that this is not the only case however that smacks of supposition doesn't it, what are these other offences?
'He who is without sin' springs to mind, It's dirty politics to smear even organisations that work for the crown if they dare to threaten the power of government, the media is a powerful tool in this and are adept at it clearly.

I would appreciate your opinion joey but will understand if you don't wish to comment.
Would you say the current government has harnessed the power of the press to discredit public services in the hope of smoothing the way for privatisation?

I trust the police tbh

Osborne? This article is written by Peter Oborne, he's a journalist and nothing more, certainly not a colleague of Mitchell

Channel 4 got involved as they managed to obtain footage casting doubt on the police's story, part of their job to make the public aware of that I would say. The other cases are mentioned in the article

These are cases which got next to no attention at all, before we get into the ones that have been going on for years like Hillsborough, Stephen Lawrence, the Jean Charles de Menezes shooting etc.