Search the Community

Who will be our member of the year for 2015? It could be you! Over the last 12 months we have been keeping a league table for members where they receive points depending on contributions to the forum. To see the league table CLICK HERE. These are the current standings. At the end of the December the member with the most points will win our Member Of The Year 2015 title and a £30 voucher for Police-Supplies.co.uk The question we have for you now is, do we owe you any points? You can win points for a variety of things and we have tried to keep up with the awarding of them, however, we have possibly missed some here and there. A list of what you can win points for can be found by CLICKING HERE and we want you to check that you have the appropriate points for the appropriaten actions. If you believe you are owed some points then please PM a mod, explain what you think you are missing points for and if possible provide a link back to it. You will notice the last few entries on the points list don't specify an amount, this is becasue Mods have the ability to award any amount of points they wish for any actions they see as deserving. If in doubt just ask. It's a close run competition at present and we are sure many more points are going to be added throughout December, so don't miss out and ensure you check your total is correct, once the award has been made at the end of December any requests for missed points will not count. There will be only one winner in the event of a draw on points the overall winner be decided by the Adminstration and Moderation team. Good luck Cheetah

Source.

An £800m plan to protect neighbourhood policing and safeguard the jobs of 10,000 police officers over the next three years is to be outlined by the shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, on Friday. The “efficiency savings” are to be funded by scrapping elected police and crime commissioners, ending the subsidy of the gun licensing system and by making police forces share back-office and procurement services. Labour’s crime and justice manifesto will create a victims’ law, make prisons places of hard work and learning, ban the sale of “legal highs” from the streets and establish of a new commissioner to tackle sexual and domestic violence. The party’s manifesto says that a Labour government would legislate to introduce a new “local policing commitment” which would guarantee neighbourhood policing in every area. The Association of Chief Police Officers warned last November that a further 20% cut in Home Office funding over the next parliament could see more than 34,000 police jobs, including 22,000 officers, disappear out of a total workforce of 205,000. The Home Office is one of the most vulnerable unprotected departments in the new round of spending cuts that is expected after the next election, whatever its outcome. The number of police officers in England and Wales has already fallen by 16,000 as a result of the first round of austerity cuts from a peak of 141,600 at the time of the last election to 125,400 a year ago. The Conservatives have not said where they will find the next round of cuts in the Home Office budget beyond the home secretary, Theresa May, talking about the need to integrate police, fire and ambulance services and to equip officers with body-worn video cameras and smartphone apps to save time. Cooper said that her package to safeguard 10,000 police officer jobs over the next three years would mean scrapping the expensive police and crime commissioners, halving the cost of police governance and ending the police subsidy of gun licences. Labour said the cancellation of next year’s police and crime commissioner elections would save £50m, with a further £25m a year saved by replacing them with a “leaner local government alternative”. The document is not expected to spell out what that alternative is, but the Stephens commission on policing set up by Labour ruled out a return to unelected police authorities. Instead it proposed policing boards made up of local council leaders within each force area, who would have the power to hire and fire chief constables and set budgets. The remaining cost of funding 10,000 police officers would come from a sum of £38m a year achieved from full cost recovery for gun licences, implementing the late night levy on clubs and pubs and increases in fees for driver education courses. The party claims that £172m in the first year, rising to £443m in year three, can be saved by compulsory joint procurement among police forces, and that £64m in year one, rising to £313m in year three, can be saved by mandating shared services between forces. Commenting on the crime and justice manifesto, the party leader, Ed Miliband, said: “Neighbourhood policing – the foundation of good policing – is at risk of disappearing, while increasing numbers of serious criminals are being left off the hook. “Labour has a better plan. We will make different choices, finding savings to safeguard 10,000 officers in the next three years. We will ensure victims are at the heart of the criminal justice system with the country’s first ever victims’ law. And we will ensure the police have the powers they need to keep us safe, including proper controls for dangerous terror suspects.” The manifesto will outline plans to set up a new Whitehall child protection unit and new powers to prevent an adult contacting or communicating with a child if there is evidence of abuse. It wants to ban the use of “community resolutions” in domestic violence cases and ensure all young people are taught about healthy relationships by introducing age-appropriate sex and relationship education in all state-funded schools. Labour proposes to overhaul the Prevent anti-radicalisation programme, toughen controls on terror suspects and strengthen the law on tackling hate crime. View the full article