Licence Checks

On Friday 7th December a team Special Constables from  Copeland Policing team carried out licensed premises checks in the public houses and clubs within Whitehaven.

The first part of the night started off with a specialised training session presented by Sgt Richard Farnworth (Community Safety Sergeant based at Workington.) This training covered the laws and regulations involved licenced premises and what they would need to look for when they were checking premises.

On completion off  the training, officers left the police station in two groups and went to the local town public houses. On arrival at the public houses Special Constables checked the licences and various other pieces of paperwork, this involved completing various  forms and speaking directly to the licence holders / designated person. There were several different premises that were found to be committing offences such as not displaying their licence. Each premises was advised what they would need to do to rectify these issues the officers  had identified.

Specials Sergeant Nick Oliver set up the operation in conjunction with Sgt Farnworth. This is what Nick had to say: “I have been working in Copeland for about the last 9 months and several Specials on my team informed me that they would be interested to see what goes on behind the scenes with public house licences. I then organised some training through Sgt Farnworth for us all. It was a very interesting training session.This enabled us to carry out the visits and we gave advice on this occasion to the licensee`s as we discovered several offences in some of the premises   The outcome of the night is that it  sends out the message to licenced premises that they must ensure that all of their documentation is correct and that they have the correct number of staff either working in the bar or on the doors that are all trained and  hold the correct certificates as required by law.”

 As the night went on we completed the licence checks and then reverted to public order patrols, this involved Policing the night time economy of Whitehaven. We attended several incidents of disorder in the town centre. One person was issued with a Section 27 banning notice which meant they had been involved in disorder in town and were required to leave immediatly. If they failed to comply with this then they would have been arrested. Another person was arrested for being drunk and disorderly in a public place.

The licence checks were repeated in Allerdale on Saturday 15^th December. This is what S/Sgt Kyle Pearson had to say about the event in Allerdale: “It was a very positive night for us in Allerdale we visited several pubs in the Workington and Cockermouth area. All of the landlords and licensees were very cooperative, they were all informed we would be doing regular checks on premises in the coming months.”

Specials Chief Inspector Carol Reid had this to say: "I am pleased to see that Nick has listened to his team and  approached Sgt Farnworth with regards to the Licence training. Following up this training and putting into practise all that was learnt on the night and then by educating the licensee's.  This is a new initiative in  the West TPA and will be on-going for the future."

Thanks for taking the time to read my blog again! Stay tuned for more info!

Thanks. Nick.

Street safe and patrol

This Friday evening I along with 4 other specials assisted with a stay safe operation in Whitehaven. This involved patrolling the area of Whitehaven to make sure that any youths in the area were safe and not under the influence of alcohol. During the night I worked with a PCSO and checked all the known areas it was good to see that all the young people in the area were attending the youth groups. These groups have been set up in order to allow young people to have somewhere to go, to socialise and have some fun!

During the night we spoke to several groups of youths all were enjoying themselves without the need for alcohol.

Later on in the night I paired up with another special and we went out and about patrolling the local area we stopped several vehicles for various defects and educated the drivers about tyres, lights etc.

All in all it was a fairly busy night for us and one I hope to repeat soon!

Thanks for reading.

Nick.

Patrol 9th November 2012

Good evening everyone,

Thanks again for having a look at my blog, I am sorry for the delay in putting anything up but I have been very busy recently.

I went out on shift this Friday, at the start of the shift (around 5pm) I kitted up and went into the briefing room. There were a few regulars in already and I even got offered some cake! We all got briefed and I was paired up with another Special on some enquiries for the first part of the shift. I got hold of some keys to a van and we headed out to try and complete our enquiries. Unfortunately the person we wanted to see wasn't at home so we carried on with our patrol. We had the laser speed detection device with us so we decided to do some speed reduction patrols in some local areas. We sat up at the first place for a matter of minutes and a member of the public in their vehicle came down the road. This vehicle also had a headlight and tail light out. I also noticed the driver had his fog lights on. We stopped the vehicle and spoke to the driver he was very apologetic and got a VDRS (Vehicle Defect Rectification Scheme,) for the lights that were out. (A VDRS is a form that is filled in by us for a driver to get defects on their vehicle fixed. When they have had it fixed they get the form stamped at a garage and send it back to us. There is not fine with it if they send the form back!) 

We carried on with our patrol checking some local hot spots for anti social behaviour, there weren't many people around the areas so we got out and had a walk, people always comment how they like to see a bobby on the street so I always try to get out on foot when I can. Around about 2000 we had reports come in that a male was causing a nuisance in a local town so we travelled over to talk to him. After several trips there and back another patrol finally spoke to this male around 21:30 and informed him of the error of his ways! The male then went home without further problems.

At around 22:30 I dropped my colleague off as he was finishing some paperwork and I headed out into town. The centre of town was starting to busy up and the people were pouring out of the pubs. I had a drive round and spoke to a few people around town. I was just about to head back in to finish at 23:50 when a call came in about disorder in a local pub. I drove down there and saw several patrols already on the scene. A male was shouting at the dog handler and using some very choice language. I decided to give him a Section 27 disorder notice. This notice is designed as an alternative to arrest for those involved in alcohol related disorder, a person is given this form and is banned from the particular area for a period up to 48 hours. I gave this male a banning order for the next 10 hours and he left without a problem.

I travelled back in and updated the computer with everything I had been doing. I then booked off duty and went home! Hopefully the shift will be as lively next week! 

Thanks again for reading.

Nick.

A busy weekend!

Good Morning everyone,

This is the first chance I am getting to post since my busy weekend last weekend. On Friday last week I did a night shift in Copeland. My plan for the night was to work until midnight but this very soon changed as the night got busier and busier!

I had barely got through the door of the Police station when two of the Sgts and an Inspector came running down the corridor to the vehicle yard. They told myself and two other Specials that they needed us up at a local hot spot sharpish, so as fast as I could I put my kit on, booked on duty and went out to the back yard. The Special I was working with has been response trained so he was able to get us all to the scene quite quickly and safely. On arrival we found out that a male had tried to steal some money from behind the counter of a building society in the middle of the day. Our job was to do traffic control and get witness details. Luckily the male was caught and taken to custody.

We then returned back to the station to get briefed up and head out. I was tasked along with another Special Sgt with going to some local youth groups. This was now in our Specials portfolio so it is our job to attend these groups each week. This allowed us to network with local youths and youth workers, we did get some funny looks as we walked into the groups with the usual "it was him who did it," but everyone opened up pretty quickly to us and we were able to let the youths know we arent just out to "ruin their fun." Due to the vast size of the area we work in we could only visit three of the 9 youth groups in the night.

On arrival back to the station I had some tea that was very much needed. The Inspector then came to see me and asked if I would like to join them on a traffic operation.

Three vehicles left the station in the early evening, I had been paired with another Special who has a lot more service that I do. We plotted up in various areas while the Inspector did some speed enforcement work. Within 2 minutes of being there we had a car travelling at 96MPH in a 70MPH zone. The first group of offices went and spoke to the drive. Next we got a driver doing 106MPH so we stopped him and completed the various paperwork. When we had finished dealing with him another shout came over that a vehicle was doing 131MPH in a 70MPH zone. Needless to say this vehicle was stopped and the driver dealt with by means of reporting him. These speeds were well in excess of the legal 70mph for that stretch of road. We educated all the drivers with some facts about how long it would take them to stop if they had to from those speeds.

We then left the operation and travelled into town. It was relatively quiet night until a local started to argue with both us and other local people. This caused problems for both us and for the local night clubs. This group was dealt with by us and other officers and one male was arrested as a result of what had happened.

At around 1am it was time to head in and complete the various paperwork! This took me up until 3am to do! I feel for my regular colleagues who have much more paperwork than we do. All in all it was a good (but long) night shift. I felt the most important thing I did that night was the education of those drivers, they now understand that they shouldn't be travelling at those speeds and what can happen when they do.

Thanks for reading.

If you are interested in joining the Specials please contact us on 101 or follow us on Twitter @CumbriaSpecials.

Thanks again. Nick.

Maritime Festival - Whitehaven

On Saturday I worked the yearly Whitehaven Maritime Festival, I wrote up this blog on that day but due to there being so many people in town I couldn't get my phone to upload the blog, the network was jammed! It was a lovely summer day and the sun shone on us throughout the day. The boats in Whitehaven Harbour have all been decorated for the up and coming Diamond Jubilee. The whole site was made to look fantastic and all the organisers and sponsors deserve a lot of credit for pulling off such a huge festival.

Throughout the festival around 200'000 people are expected to flock into the small West Cumbrian town of Whitehaven with around 15'000 people on the harbour side. There seemed a lot more than this this year!

We were kept busy throughout the day seizing alcohol from people and making sure everyone had an enjoyable time. The festival was a complete no drinking zone so we had to take large amounts of alcohol from people who sometimes didn’t think it should have been taken!

The great and the good have been out and about with Catherine Jenkins performing on Friday night to a large ground and Ainslie Harriet giving cooking demonstrations to the on looking crowds on Saturday.

Unfortunately the day wasn't without its problems; there had been quite a bad assault the night before meaning some follow up enquires needed to be done.

Please remember when you are out and about at festivals have fun and look after yourselves. It is so easy to become a victim of crime so please don’t let this happen to you!

Please feel free to chat with us on 101 or follow us on Twitter! @CumbriaSpecials.

Thanks again for reading. Nick.

Sorry for the delay

Good afternoon!

First of all I must apologise for the delay in writing a blog post, the last few weeks has been a very busy time for both myself and colleagues.

One of the highlights of the last few weeks for me was attending the 5 day driver training course at HQ. This course was great and I could feel my driving skill improving in the 5 days I was there. We spent time learning the errors of our ways in relation to how we had been driving for the last few years. The course helped us to improve basic skills that we had all let slide over the years we had been driving. It was a tiring course and we really had to be on the ball. It is important for us all to remember when a member of the public sees a Police car they expect the people in it to act professional at all times and for their driving to be exemplary even if they are not response trained. It was a fantastic course and taught me a lot. I would like to say a Special thanks to the trainers at HQ!  

There are lots of things coming up in the next few weeks not only for our area but also for the whole county. One of the biggest things in our calendar starts in the coming weeks, that being Appleby Horse Fair. If you are unfamiliar with Appleby it is a small town outside of Penrith in Cumbria and each year on about the second weekend in June it plays host to a large amount of travellers. The travellers come to sell and trade horses and spend around a week in the area. There is a huge Policing presence throughout the fair and this is complemented by large amounts of Specials attending in order to make sure everyone has a fun and enjoyable time. I hope this years fair goes well!

Here in West Cumbria next weekend we will be having the annual Maritime festival, this sees thousands of people flock to the small seaside town of Whitehaven to enjoy live bands, good food and alcohol. This year Special Constables are assisting with patrolling the area and helping people to have a fun and enjoyable time!

If you are interested in joining the Specials for an interesting and rewarding part time occupation please ring 101 and speak to our coordinator Shirley Murray.

If you have any ideas on how we can improve this blog please tweet us @CumbriaSpecials or call us on 101.

I will keep you updated with another blog next weekend! :-).

Thanks again.

Nick.

Sad times

I start my blog today with some very sad news. Our friend and colleague PC Craig Postlethwaite passed away this week after being involved in a collision in a nearby town. My thoughts are with PC Postlethwaite family at this very sad time. His funeral is being held this coming Monday. It is such a sad loss for the Constabulary and for all the people who knew and loved Craig.  

I have not had much time to update my blog in recent weeks due to being busy with both family life and work life. I have still been out on duty but have been working with my S/Inspector and S/Chief Inspector to improve the team where I work. This involves developing the team with additional training and by planning operations.

Part of my portfolio for my NPT is to develop and run Roads Policing operations and in conjunction with regular NPT supervisors work out where best to help reduce collisions. Recently I set up and ran an event in the local NPT area to target speeding vehicles. This was an education campaign and helped us to teach drivers the danger of speed on the roads. We spent time in various areas across the NPT including St Bees. This area has been outlined as a priority by the local Policing teams and community alike. We stopped around 8 vehicles in St Bees all for doing in excess of 30MPH. The drivers all took the information on board and were very pleased when they found out they would not be getting a ticket for the offence they had committed. We received lots of positive information from the local public, it is amazing how much thanks you get for attempting to solve a problem such as this in a community area. People really do appreciate seeing Police on their streets and it still humbles me when they thank us for the work we have done.

We spent time during the day around the area moving from St Bees in to Whitehaven itself then towards Distington a local town with speeding vehicle problems. We stopped more vehicles again and gave out various penalty tickets and producers for various offences. Again this was all received well by the public. We got the odd face pulled by people as they drove past but we are trying to make the road safer for them and their families!

Another couple of things of note from the previous weeks are the Streetsafe operation we ran along with various ASB patrols. The Streetsafe operation was run in conjunction with local charities and organisations such as Social Services. This operation is designed to make sure youths are safe when on the streets and if they are found drunk they get returned to their homes. This operation was quite successful and saw lots of youths returned to their homes and parents given advice. An ASB operation was also run in conjunction with PCSOs where officers tackled various anti social issues in the BCU.

We recently also did training on Fast Roads Policing, this allows us to be safer on the local roads and protect vehicle accident scenes.

I am looking forward to running another operation soon!

If you require any information or would be interested in joining the Special Constabulary please contact our Coordinator PC Shirley Murray on 101.

Nick.

Whitehaven Town

Evening everyone,

Sorry it is taking me a few days to get some blogs put up but struggling with time at the moment! I thought I would give you all an update of the things I did this weekend and hopefully keep it interesting for you.

I was out on duty on Friday night with a regular cop assisting him with patrolling the whole local area. The regular Sgt had paired us up and initially sent us to the hospital to deal with a high risk detainee, luckily one of the other local units was already dealing so we got to continue patrolling the streets. The area we Police is quite a large area, during the night we travelled from Whitehaven through Cleator Moor, Egremont, Sellafield and Calderbridge, if you don't know the geography that is an area roughly the size of Salford!! Quite a big patch to Police. We only covered around 1/4 of our patch that night. It was a busy night in all and we topped it off with a drugs warrant on a local property. While I cant go in to details a male was arrested for possession of a controlled substance with intent to supply. It was a job involving many Police officers and took quite a while to sort afterwards. It just goes to show people drugs don't pay!

We attended several grade 1 listed calls but the majority were calm when we arrived. With us being on such a big patch it is a long way from one IR to another meaning we sometimes get there after other units. The shift ended with relatively low amounts of paperwork but with a successful result. Back out again this coming weekend so hope to give you more thrilling tales.

Please follow us on @CumbriaSpecials on Twitter.

Thanks. Nick. West S/Sgt.

First Shift

I completed my first shift in Whitehaven this weekend and managed to cover about 8 miles on foot patrol all around the NPT area. It was a very interesting and very rewarding night. It's amazing how much contact we got from the public with people saying how nice it was to see police on the streets in their area. It seems to make a real difference to people to see a police officer and it seems public reassurance is top priority at the moment! While regular colleagues were flying around to various emergency jobs we had time to engage with the public and really give something back. It was a long shift and my feet ache today but very worth while!!

New Post in West Cumbria

Well this is my first blog in my new role as a Specials Sergeant. I recently moved to a different part of the county and due to this had to take a demotion to one rank lower than I was before. This was a big decision for me as it meant I wouldn't be managing such a big team of Specials anymore.

 

My previous role was very intensive and required a lot of time, I was managing a team of around 30 Specials and organising training, I really enjoyed doing this job but didn’t find as much time to get out on the streets.

 

I thought I would start a blog and try and give you all a weekly update of interesting things that have happened. I hope to make these blogs short and hope to also keep you entertained.

 

The role of a Special is constantly changing and even in my short service I have seen some radical changes, the majority of our time is now spent doing Neighbourhood Policing and helping our regular colleagues reassure and assist the public in some very difficult and challenging times. I feel sorry for Police Chiefs who are required to make some very difficult decisions; my respect goes out to them.

 

I am back out doing operational policing this weekend and hope to be able to bring you some interesting stories from my time back on the streets!

 

Please follow Cumbria Specials on Twitter @CumbriaSpecials

 

Thanks. Nick.