Sucking Eggs

After reading the excellent article in Police Review w/e 3rd June 2011 by Hollie Clemence entitled “Officers urged to ‘look and feel’ cheerful” she reports that ACPO is drafting an Olympic 'Look and Feel' strategy document which they claim will provide a 'consistent message' on how officers on mutual aid during the games are maintaining the 'highest of standards'.

Summarising, it is basically telling officers working during the Olympics how to dress, how to talk and even to remember to smile.

ACPO have also stated that every officer must be trained in the fine art of egg sucking and will be trained to NVQ level although cut backs mean that you will need to provide your own eggs during the 12 week course.

Alright, I made that last bit up, but really, are they serious?!

First of all, exactly how much money are they wasting on this ridiculous and quite frankly insulting report?

Secondly, just exactly who do ACPO think they are?

Not only are they insulting the very officers their thousands of pounds trained and the vast majority have years of experience but instead of backing us up with the ongoing dispute with the government they are basically telling us to just “grin and bear it”

What with the Winsor Report pay and conditions biting into its first year by the time the Olympics come along many officers working the long tiring hours are not going to be wanted to told to “smile and be nice”

What ACPO need to realise is that police officers will continue to do the job we were employed for. It's the job we joined for and want to do.

So please, don't insult our professionalism. We don't need to be told how to dress and how to smile. We do this every day and don't need expensive reports to be reminded how to do it.

What I will ask is for you to declare how much this farce of a report cost and why the money wasn't better used for something more worthwhile, or better still, saved.


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