Good Cops

My Dad was a cop. One of my earliest memories as a little boy was walking to the Detroit courthouse on a sunny morning, holding his hand. Dad was going to court to testify in a criminal case, dressed in his Detroit Police uniform, smilingly acknowledging the greetings of passersby. I remember then saying to him how proud I was that I was the son of a policeman.

It must have been three of four years later, sitting in the front bench of our 1954 Ford sedan, when I was paging through Tuebor, the official publication of the Detroit Police Officers Association (its title taken from the Michigan State seal, meaning “I will defend”). My Dad, not in his uniform this time, was driving, when I noticed his name in the top group of exam results for sergeant. The top group was usually a dead cert for promotion. “Wow, Dad, this means you’re going to be a sergeant! Great!” I exclaimed. “Nope,” he mumbled. “Why not? You’re at top of the list.” “I’m not bent.”

I cast no aspersions cast upon the DPD, just a story to relate my first understanding of “good cops”. There are police who are bent or corrupt, of course, and those who do beat and even rape women, and who do brutalise people of colour. I would encounter some of those as I grew up. But there are good cops, too. And my Dad knew that both worked side-by-side.

Now, much later in life, and living in a different country, I have decided to try to find out what it actually means to be a “good cop”.

I started by looking at the news. But it is difficult to find positive stories about the police today because much of the current media and its listening public are not on the side of the good cop; they are focused – rightly – on exposing, condemning and eliminating corruption, brutality and racism in uniform. In these days when Musk and Farage level sensationalist charges of “two-tier policing”, many media outlets appear reluctant to print positive stories about the police.

And television isn’t very helpful either. There are, of course, some positive shows, like Channel 4’s documentary on the police hunt for the culprits who felled the Sycamore Gap – which follows a police team operating with great patience, community engagement and forensic ability. But that’s countered by less appealing depictions, like in the BBC’s very popular Riot Women, where cops are misogynist and uncaring, or in its recent (somewhat dodgy) Panorama exposé of Charing Cross police station.

So, instead of perusing the news, I decided to just talk with police officers whom I encounter on the street to find out just how hard (or easy) it is to be “good”. Now, I know that some of those with whom I have spoken may well be corrupt or racist or misogynist or brutal. There’s little way of randomly finding good cops. But I have learned a few things from those who have been willing to speak with me that are worth sharing.

First, the media onslaught makes the job even tougher than it is. There are no more “greetings from passersby” that my Dad experienced years ago; there is little respect for the uniform. That makes the work of community safety, in a community filled with suspicion and disdain, much more difficult, despite the fact that that same community is demanding more “more bobbies on the beat” and more rapid response to social disorder and street crime. Public confidence in UK policing (in data from 2022) is at an all-time low, with support from Gen Z falling well below 50%.

Policing in the UK is rooted in the concept of policing by consent; community safety is a social result that requires collective endeavour and responsibility. Without that collaboration, no amount of community volunteers’ repairing “Broken Windows” will ensure a safe neighbourhood. And all of that is happening in the face of a 20,000 reduction in the numbers of UK police officers from 2010’s high of 172,000, because of government austerity programmes. There has been some non-compensatory increases since 2019, and the new government has promised even more police, but there remains a shameful hesitancy to provide strong political support to policing by either side of the aisle.

Second, I’m told by some older cops – and maybe only because they are older – that younger cops aren’t sticking to the job. One well-past retirement-age constable (he said he was staying on voluntarily to make up for dropping numbers) told me that very few of the young recruits in his command unit stay on the job for more than two years. “They just can’t take the attitude of the public”; they don’t encounter – let alone enjoy – community support. And that in the face of what many have told me remains a dysfunctional recruitment process that cannot weed out potential “bad cops” before they’re brought into the force.

Third, the roles of the British police have changed, often to compensate for the failure of other public services, also a result of austerity cuts. The principal tasks of British police have traditionally included public reassurance; crime prevention and detection; bringing offenders to justice; preserving public order; and traffic safety. The last of these has for all intents and purposes been abandoned. But filling the gap is dealing with those presenting mental health problems, often on our streets. Police in many British cities have become a frontline of mental health care, often without the training and support needed by those they serve. And many mental health providers, both public and charitable, are reluctant to provide that support and training to a police service that so many hold in suspicion and disdain. The result is poor care.

What all that does for your everyday constable is fuel the prevalent canteen culture, where one’s support and encouragement can only be sought from peers (because no one else is available or cares), whose mutual physical protection is guaranteed on the street by your keeping mum about any colleagues’ misbehaviours or crimes: support from a culture that includes the bad cops who are actually undermining your wider community support.

So what am I doing about what I’ve learned? Not a lot, sadly. I’m still talking with constables randomly on the street and I’m still learning. At some stage I need to start doing some more proper research and factchecking.

But so far, I know this: A strong, effective and accountable police force is essential for a thriving economy and a fair society. We need to combine scrutiny that eliminates bad policing and support that fosters the professionalism and dedication of good cops. Yet we do little to cheer on effective and accountable police.

It reminds me of those fans at a football match who jeer their home side when the play isn’t up to scratch.

Our good cops are not going to win that way.

More anon.