POLICE AND HEALTH and SAFETY

The drowning of Jordan Lyon has stirred up quite a lot of comment, much of it uncomplimentary to the PCSOs involved. Greater Manchester police continue to insist that for reasons of Health and Safety the PCSOs took the right action in not entering the water as they are not trained for it. Apparently this applies to many real policemen as well. Some letters to the press have pointed out that they had a duty as human beings. It's also only fair to say that accounts of what happened seem rather vague at times but it appears that by the time the PCSOs arrived on the scene that Jordan was already under water. A Sergeant Craig Lippitt who stripped off and dived in had also not been trained in water rescue. Greater Manchester say they will not discipline him for this breach of discipline so he's better off than Tam Brown, a firefighter I referred to in previous post, who was reprimanded after rescuing a woman from the Tay. I suspect that Sergeant Lippitt is one of many thousands of decent officers who want to get on with doing the job like the blogger David Copperfield. David Copperfield has recently "come out" and given his real name. He's off to police Canada. I wish him the best in his future life but he's the sort of officer we can ill afford to lose.