Roads Policing Must Be Prioritised

TRAFFIC and roads policing must be part of the debate when it comes to prioritising which parts of policing require attention, according to South Yorkshire Police Federation.

The PFEW has called for roads policing to be a prioritised to reverse years of damage which has led to the number of dedicat3ed police officers fall and a rise in the number of motorists injured and dying on the roads.

South Yorkshire Police Federation says the public are seeing fewer patrol cars on the motorways but acknowledges that there are so many other police priorities vying for Government cash and attention.

Chairman Steve Kent said: “Everything in policing needs to be uplifted, so it’s not picking about one over the other.

“But when we look at traffic specifically I think it’s actually, in many ways, the most visible reduction in policing for a lot of the public.

“I use the motorway every single day to come to work and back. Every day. I can’t tell you the last time I saw a motorway patrol car.

“If you ask the majority of the public, they will tell you that especially on the motorways, it has got significantly worse over the last decade.”

Steve is worried that the use of Smart Motorways is being seen as a way to reduce that visible police presence. The hi-tech highways have had their criticisms in the past, with safety campaigners saying they haven’t been proved to reduce motorway fatalities.

Steve added: “Because we’re relying on Smart Motorways we don’t catch people’s poor driving habits, and there is no policing presence on the roads.

“That is something I think the public can relate to. You haven’t got that presence any more, so people can just drive like complete idiots on the motorway without any recourse whatsoever as long as they slow down for a fixed camera.

“It absolutely needs to be addressed. All our traffic officers in South Yorkshire, if they come onto a serious incident, that’s them done for the day or the foreseeable future.

“There’s not going to be any of that proactive, ‘let’s go out there and deal with the idiots who are driving around as they do, or poor driving practices’, or intelligence-led roads policing.

“Against the backdrop that all policing needs to be returned back to its normal level, I think roads is a significant one.”

However, Steve admitted it is not an easy task to decide on priority areas.

He explained: “If I ask any frontline uniform officer, ‘do you think that traffic needs to be sorted out’, and they said, ‘no, we do first’, I’d say, ‘hang on a minute, the last time you went to a serious incident there was no traffic available’.

“So actually when people take that step back they will see it because now traffic can only possibly attend the most serious of road accidents involving fatalities.

“In the past, they’ve come to incidents where their level of expertise can help frontline officers.

“The narrative has forgotten traffic officers a little bit. I’m pleased as well as for our detective colleagues, and as well as our uniform colleagues, that there’s a bit more awareness.”