Swasie Turner MBE is a former police officer who was seriously injured in the line of duty. A long-time wheelchair user, he has raised money for various charities by climbing and racing in his wheelchair, as well as event speaking. Here, the outspoken Swasie discusses the need to use one’s initiative... and what happens when toeing the line goes one step too far...

For my ‘maiden’ column for the Custodial Review magazine I would like to highlight the ongoing and unbelievable incidents that prevail via those egotists who continue to abuse their power out and about on our streets. Not only do our national newspapers furnish me with daily examples of absolute lunacy by some who are completely devoid of initiative, sympathy or even simple understanding, but I too continually witness such examples as I push my trusty 47lb front-castored NHS wheelchair (a ‘legacy’ of my front line police service) out and about each day. I can’t believe the behaviour of some of those who are given a uniform and told to ‘administer justice’ as they patrol the streets as various wardens, ie – traffic, dog, litter etc.

National Chair John Apter has dismissed the late publication of the Home Office’s response to the Police Remuneration Review Body (PRRB) as ‘not worth waiting for’.

The Federation evidenced the need for three-year pay deal, comprising of a 5% uplift in police officer pay this year, in 2020/21 and again in 2021/22, as a start on the road to rectifying years of below-inflation pay awards.

However in its PRRB submission, which comes nearly a month after it was expected, the Home Office says it will only make £70 million available, which equates to a pay rise of just 1.3% if spent over a 12 month period - considerably less than the recent 2.7% increase awarded to MPs.

John Apter, said: “I wish I could say it was worth waiting for. I wish I could say it had taken the additional weeks to read our published evidence and concede that, in the face of such comprehensive research and analysis, it had decided to agree with us and suggest officers receive 5% per year for each of the next three years. I wish I could, but I can’t.

The CPS’s outgoing Director of Public Prosecutions Alison Saunders spoke recently about the British Criminal Justice System “creaking” under the pressure of huge amounts of data being submitted for investigation.

For anyone working in the system, it is clear that there is a cause for concern for the future of convictions due to a lack of resources and an inability to keep up with the flood of data that new technology is presenting.

Chorus Intelligence, a provider of data cleansing and analysis software, has launched a new product, Chorus Investigator, which will help tackle the data issue following successful trials in a number of forces.

Efforts to stop children joining gangs and getting involved in violent crime will be undermined if the Government makes further cuts to the money councils receive to tackle youth offending, town halls warn today.

This comes as figures show that youth justice grants, which fund the vital work of youth offending teams (YOTs) within councils, have been halved from £145 million in 2010/11 to £71.5 million in 2018/19.

The Local Government Association, which represents 370 councils in England and Wales, says further funding cuts would seriously hamper efforts to provide vital support to young people and protect them from criminal activity, such as becoming involved in knife violence or “county line” gangs.

Councils are currently waiting to find out their youth justice grant allocations for 2019/20, despite already having had to set their overall annual budgets.

Despite financial cut-backs, the creative side of prison life always seems to win through. Events such as the annual Koestler Awards are evidence of this. So is the sterling work of, for example, Birmingham’s Geese Theatre, whose The Geese Theatre Handbook: Drama with Offenders and People at Risk has been a staple manual for trainers of all kinds since we had the privilege of working on it with them at the start of the millennium.

A similarly prized work is Michael Crowley’s Behind the Lines: Creative Writing with Offenders and People at Risk published in 2012. It shows how imaginative approaches to confronting offending behaviour - and imparting skills valuable on the outside - can have a real impact on whether someone returns to custody.

Michael is a seasoned advocate for improving literacy in the prison setting. Quite apart from giving presentations at establishments such as Bristol and Erlestoke, he was for six years writer in residence at Lancaster Farms (then a young offender institution). He also helped set up a residency at Arohata Women’s Prison in New Zealand in 2014.

The Prime Minister is delusional for failing to acknowledge the link between a scourge of youth knife crime and cuts to officer numbers, says the chair of the Police Federation of England and Wales.

Figures obtained by Channel 4 Dispatches revealed the number of children in England aged 16 and under being stabbed rose by 93% between 2016 and 2018.

Since 2010, continued cuts to the service have resulted in 21,000 fewer officers and 7,000 Police Community Support Officers - meaning fewer officers on our streets to tackle the crimes set out in the government’s serious violent crime strategy.

However, Theresa May has today insisted there was "no direct correlation" between police cuts and knife crime and stressed there was a "cross-Government" response to the problem.

Armour Communications, a leading provider of specialist, secure communications solutions, will be demonstrating the latest versions of Armour Mobile, Armour Blue and Armour Desktop at the Home Office’s Security and Policing event. 

Armour Comms’ solutions for secure communications work on everyday smartphones, tablets and Windows 10 desktops. With the same usability as consumer-grade apps, and  with significantly enhanced security, Armour Mobile supports voice calls, video calls, one-to-one and group messaging, voice and video conference calls, file attachments and sent/received/read message status. Message Burn limits the lifespan of sensitive data at rest, where users can set a time at which their messages are automatically deleted (or as the name implies, ‘burn’) on the recipient’s device, for immediate action after being read, or in the future, according to confidentiality.

Armour will be showing a technology preview of the latest version of Armour Blue which  includes Mission Critical Push to Talk (MCPTT) functionality that meets the requirements of public safety mission critical voice communication.

We welcome the ECHR’s inquiry on this important issue. Significant progress has been made in recent years supporting vulnerable defendants, particularly through the continued rollout of liaison and diversion services in police stations and courts across England.

However, far more could be done to ensure the justice system meets its duties under equality law, for instance through the increased use of accessible information, intermediaries and other reasonable adjustments.

The company’s key objective is to protect police, prison and security officers, and to reduce the number of knife and workplace violence related injuries.

UK based PPSS Group has recently seen record sales for their SlashPRO® Slash Resistant Clothing brand, offering tested, certified and reliable levels of cut resistance.

Poverty and social exclusion, religious and political extremism, drugs, social media as well as serious mental illnesses have all been blamed for the global rise of knife crime.

The news of individuals grabbing a kitchen knife and causing serious harm and injury to others has become a rather normal daily occurrence today.

Knives have recently also become the weapon of choice for many so called “lone-wolf” attackers due to the low planning required to conduct a knife attack whether against an individual or mass group.

Recycling Lives, a social business which enables prisoners to gain skills and qualifications to help them reduce their risk of reoffending on release, has been awarded the 2019 Robin Corbett Award for Prisoner Re-integration. Recycling Lives works in 11 UK prisons and was nominated for the award for its work at HMP Wymott in Lancashire.

The organisation engages up to 250 men and women at a time in its HMP Academies programme, which employs offenders in either recycling or fabrication work. It supports each man and woman to address offending behaviours, develop skills and secure work and housing for release. Fewer than 5% of participants reoffend and more than 70% find employment on release.