Crimebotch UK
IMAGINE going to wo work each day expecting someone to t attack you, or wondering what sort s of abuse you’ll face during yo your shift.
How could you do th the job you love when you know you’ll re receive contempt, bile and downrigh downright hate from the people you’re trying to serve? Thinki Thinking that many of those you encounter will w want to kick your y head in?
Or stab you repeatedly r with a ah huge machete? That is the reality for police offic officers like Stuart Outten, 28. He joined jo the Met a decade ago and “loves being a police officer and protecting th the public”.
He was almost killed d doing his job on Thursday – even as he wa was being hacked he continued to protect the public by firing his Taser at the attacker. att
When his boss visited h him in hospital p PC Outten shrugged it all l off, insisting: “I’m OK.”
Because, as Det Chief Supt upt Richard Tucker explai explained: d: “Some officers think it is part art of the job to be assaulted assaulted.” But he added: “It is not.”
Mr Tucker said the brutal rutal attack was: “A symptom symp m of people having less fear of the he police... a sense of a lac lack of respect, not just for police but for authority. It’s shocking but unfortunately it’s not uncommon.”
Assaults on police officers rose 18 per cent to nearly 31,000 in the year to March.
And in a poll last year 32 per cent of Brits said they have less respect or no respect at all for the police.
Because they still expect the traditional neighbourhood policing that the Government has wiped out.
Police numbers in England and Wales fell by 21,723 between 2010 and 2018, because Tory cuts have slashed funding by 19 per cent.
And the devastation of youth and community services mean more young people are caught up in gang culture, fuelling the knife crime epidemic and breakdown of respect for authority.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has pledged to put another 20,000 officers on the streets with powers and support to tackle violent crime.
And he p promises tougher sentences for tho those carrying knives.
If he does he may reduce the bile and co contempt he faces as he goes about h his own work.
Beca Because larger forces with more resource resources are the only way to restore authorit authority and protect officers like PC Outten.
W Who deserve our respect and
gratitude every single day.