|
Title: British Transport Police to run new helicopter service Post by: Brucey on October 26, 2010, 12:28:02 Just saw this story on the BBC News website and was a little shocked to read the bit I've highlighted
Quote The police helicopters of England and Wales are to be merged into a single National Police Air Service. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11627331A "shadow service" will begin next year and the full national service will roll out in 2012. Currently there are 33 aircraft at 30 different bases. These all belong to individual forces. The National Police Air Service will have 23 aircraft at 20 bases. This will save ^15m from the current total of ^66m. The service, which will also have three spare choppers, will provide 24-hour cover with a 20-minute response time for 97% of the population of England and Wales. In many forces there is only cover for about 18 hours at present. British Transport Police will be in charge of the service's command and control structure It is not clear if police forces in Scotland and Northern Ireland plan to follow suit. Police helicopters are regularly used by forces chasing suspects on foot and in vehicles and can also be a vital tool in the search for missing people. But there have been fears expressed that the new service will be poorer. In August the chairman of the Hampshire branch of the Police Federation, John Apter, warned about plans to merge the force's helicopters with those of Sussex and Surrey. He said: "I'm confident the service won't be badly affected, but we have to accept that in reducing from three to two aircraft, there has got to be a level of service that is diminished. The service I hope we will obtain will be adequate but it's clearly not the Rolls-Royce service we've been used to." I thought BTP only had one helicopter, so it seems a strange way of managing this new force? Title: Re: British Transport Police to run new helicopter service Post by: JayMac on October 26, 2010, 13:29:30 Well, BTP is a nationwide force, so it kinda makes sense for them to run the command and control structure, rather than the Home Office having to set up a whole new one.
Title: Re: British Transport Police to run new helicopter service Post by: SDS on October 26, 2010, 16:02:51 Great, BTP using more of its limited resources to help civi police. Hope BTP gonna get a kickback which they will invest into being more visible.
Nah didn't think so. Title: Re: British Transport Police to run new helicopter service Post by: Electric train on October 26, 2010, 16:14:28 Great, BTP using more of its limited resources to help civi police. Hope BTP gonna get a kickback which they will invest into being more visible. I would think that the Police observers would be transfered to BTP or seconded along with some of the managerial teams, personally I think this is good news for BTPNah didn't think so. This page is printed from the "Coffee Shop" forum at http://gwr.passenger.chat which is provided by a customer of Great Western Railway. Views expressed are those of the individual posters concerned. Visit www.gwr.com for the official Great Western Railway website. Please contact the administrators of this site if you feel that content provided contravenes our posting rules ( see http://railcustomer.info/1761 ). The forum is hosted by Well House Consultants - http://www.wellho.net |