The Government have \u201cstabbed police officers in the back\u201d by blaming them for increases in crime following years of under-resourcing, South Yorkshire Police Federation has said.<\/p>\n
Chair Steve Kent spoke out after the Home Secretary put pressure on underfunded and overstretched officers to take on every single crime.<\/p>\n
Officers must investigate every theft and follow all reasonable leads to catch offenders, Home Secretary Suella Braverman said last week, adding that it was \u201ccompletely unacceptable\u201d that criminals are often \u201ceffectively free to break certain laws\u201d.<\/p>\n
But Steve said: \u201cThis is simply impossible. Yet again, we see the Government essentially stabbing police in the back. They are blaming the police for crime figures that they have created by the constant lack of funding we\u2019ve seen over the past 13 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn South Yorkshire, we still have too few officers. We now have around 3,100 officers, where our peak was 3,500 \u2013 so we don\u2019t have anywhere near enough compared to where we were. These are simply impossible expectations and little more than political posturing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe public aren\u2019t daft. They know that the police have been decimated. If the Government wants us to prioritise everything, something has to be sacrificed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just do not have the resources or the time to deal with this, when we\u2019re dealing with so much bureaucracy and so much work from our partner agencies \u2013 who are also struggling.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Government is just setting us up to fail and it\u2019s just political hot air, in my view.\u201d<\/p>\n
Police officers are struggling with lost experience and backroom staff, and with a completely new landscape that prioritises savings and efficiencies, Steve said.<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cThe knock-on effect is that we have to prioritise things. The police obviously have to, quite rightly, prioritise public protection and more serious crime. I don\u2019t know where they\u2019re going to magic these officers from to go out and deal with every theft.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe thing that is most frustrating, is that if you ask any officer, they would want to deal with every crime, to be able to go and lock somebody up. Of course they would. It\u2019s their job.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut there\u2019s absolutely no way an officer is going to spend time on a minor theft when there\u2019s no colleagues free and an immediate call comes in for a domestic violence case or a serious assault.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo it’s just completely unrealistic hot air and they need to be called out on it because it just doesn\u2019t fit.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe hypocrisy of the Government, when they\u2019re the actual cause for the decimation of policing, is unbelievable.\u201d<\/p>\n