Met Police to revise protest training after feedback from journalists

Police public order training will be revised in the light of interventions made by NUJ members during a visit to the Metropolitan Police Specialist Training Centre.

Article by Tim Dawson, NUJ freelance organiser.

The delegation of NUJ officials and 15 union members learned that all public order police are trained in the importance of the UKPCA press card (the one issued by the NUJ and other gatekeepers). 

Lead instructor Sargent Freddie Mills accepted, however, that officers’ responsibility to facilitate journalists was not always applied as well as it should be. “The evidence of journalists’ experiences that you have shared provides us with valuable lessons that will be applied to future training,” Mills told the delegation.

The visit was part of the union’s ongoing engagement with the Metropolitan Police to promote understanding between media and law enforcers. All London officers who undertake public-order work are trained at the centre, in Gravesend, Kent, which features a mocked up town centre where disturbances are simulated.

Staged riots in which trainee officers dealt with reigning projectiles and petrol bombs provided the visit’s highlight. It was the presentation before the conflagration that illuminated the evolving nature of public-order policing.

Mills said: “We increasingly use academic studies of crowd psychology. Misinformation from social media is a huge issue, but we know that within a crowd there are people with all sorts of different mindsets. Police can affect how crowds act by our own actions”.

Communication with the protesters has become more important than ever, the delegation learned. To counter mis and dis information, officers are now talking more with protestors, as well as releasing far earlier information about the ethnic identity and cultural background of those involved in high-profile cases.

PC Tom Wright explained how Police training is shaped by articles nine, 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights – the rights to free thought, conscience and religion, the right to free expression, and the right of assembly and association. “These are qualified rights, however,” he said. “Balancing the rights of individuals with different perspectives is not always easy, particularly when we arrive at an event to find five protestors and 25 people trying to live stream what they are doing”.

At the centre of the presentation that Wright delivers to trainees is their role enabling journalists who are covering events. Officers are shown examples of UKPCA (UK Press Card Authority) press cards, and instructed to facilitate media workers. Several members of the NUJ party questioned the effectiveness on the ground. Mills accepted that mistakes have been made in the past. 

Police officers volunteer to undertake public order work, or MO6 incidents, in Met jargon. “There were nearly 4,000 events in London requiring public order policing last year, all of them drawing resources away from other law enforcement,” said Mills. The possible introduction of drones to aid police could ease pressure in the future, but would require changes to civil aviation law, the delegation learned.

Officers say that the level of scrutiny they face is the most striking change of recent years. Their commitment to facilitate the professional media in this context is reassuring, even if it is the proliferation of amateur documentarists that provides the greatest challenge.

The visit was well received by NUJ members. Suzanne Fernandes said: “This visit gave me a much clearer understanding of how public order officers have to mobilise at very short notice, often in life-threatening situations.” Andrew Cleminson called the visit “interesting, insightful and enjoyable.” And Paul McLoughlin called it “a fascinating event.”

David Ayrton, Senior NUJ organiser, who  co-led the delegation, said: “Building professional respect between police and media is a cornerstone of the NUJ’s approach. Getting to know police staff and recognising their responsiveness to our issues has been a valuable staging point in this work.”

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