Funding The Police

[cassa333]

I'm all for appropriate funding and making sure our police are properly and adequately trained but do they need a degree at present to join?

If all new recruits have to have a degree(either transferable or a policing one) what happens to all the police on the beat now woithout one?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-38319283

[Old_Geezer]

Nothing happens to them. This is about new recruits.

I suspect it demonstrates how devalued the degree qualification has become since it stopped being for the academically gifted and started being a "necessity" for all.

[cassa333]

I think they will struggle even more to recruit if you have to have a degree.

[EDDIE51]

Read your Link !
It says that police can still be recruited as they are now, but the training 'on the job' will be to degree level. Once recruited they will be trained and paid while training but will have to reach degree level, while they are training they will be considered as 'on probation'.
To become a fully qualified officer they need to pass probation by getting a degree.

[mikey4444]

I really can't see any reason why Police Officers need have a degree.

Like Cassa, I am afraid it will become more difficult to recruit, and we need more Policemen, not less.

[fiction-factory]

Eddie says they will be paid to train to degree level, mikey, so that might attract some recruits who wouldn't otherwise consider it

[Ninefingers]

All matches the new age aspirations of a two class society, those who have degrees and those who don't. I know many people in roles who wouldn't be able to get their own job now.

This stems from the education policies we've seen for years (Tony B Liar again I think) in keeping kids in education as long as possible, giving them their £30 a week them to stay rather than create a new system of apprenticeships that industry could use. More and more stay in education through our colleges and universities and in turn industry and infrastructure raise their demands on new recruits.

I applied to the Police aged 19, you needed 3 o grades (ancient Scottish educational qualifications) English, Arithmetic and anything else. As long as you could write sensibly and count a little bit you had the base level of ability to join I know of a friends son who joined three years ago; with his PhD in Psychiology

[bhg481]

Or, to put it another way, they will be recruited as they are now but then made to undergo training in police-related matters and then have to pass a test (call it a degree) which shows that they are fit to be policemen. If they fail that test they will not be considered to be capable of doing a policeman's job.

[dannyk13]

Having a degree does not ensure that someone will make a good policeman.It never has.

[mikey4444]

FF.....I suppose that is possible but I think its unlikely.

[mikey4444]

Will having a degree prevent 100's of Policemen lying in future court cases, like the Hillsborough affair ?

[bhg481]

dannyk13 //Having a degree does not ensure that someone will make a good policeman.It never has. //

I agree, but failing one specifically aimed at policing could elimimate someone who wouldn't make a good policeman.

[bhg481]

mikey //Will having a degree prevent 100's of Policemen lying in future court cases, like the Hillsborough affair ? //

No more than doctors taking the hippocratic oath will eliminate Harold Shipmans.

[Old_Geezer]

Perhaps if they didn't call it a degree and admit it is a necessary job related qualification everyone in the job needs to be able to pass were they to sit it, it'd be less controversial.

[dannyk13]

bhg, Until a policeman hits the streets it is impossible to tell whether he will make a good policeman.An education is no guarantee. I have seen several well educated recruits quit the force when they realised what practical policing entailed.

[mikey4444]

bhg....I am not sure what the connection is between a Doctor who murdered hundreds of his own patients, and degrees for Policemen ?

[bhg481]

danny - I'm not disagreeing with you at all. I'm just trying to point out that you can often show that someone is not fit for the job beforehand but the only way to see if someone is capable of doing the job is to try them. Just because you have the qualifications doesn't mean you CAN do the job; failing to get the necessary qualifications almost certainly means you can't.

[bhg481]

mikey - I'm trying to point out that proving that someone is capable of doing a job (by getting a degree) doesn't prove that they will do the job well (by lying in court). In the same way that a doctor taking the oath doesn't mean that he will abide by it. Not a very good example perhaps, but it's early morning yet.

[CrapAtCryptics]

They tried this with the Prison Service years ago and it didnt work because the pay was poor and the graduates could do better elsewhere without the risk.

[mikey4444]

bhg...its nearly 09:15 here in Wales !

[bhg481]

mikey - you must be a time traveller; you posted at 9:15 Welsh time and it shows up as 9:10 Answerbank time.