Policing with Pride

Dear Colleagues,

 

It is with some emotion that I sit here now to write what will be my final article for Manchat since I bow out from the stage that is Greater Manchester Police next month. Avid readers of this column will know that I usually use this column as an opportunity to lament those things that the force gets wrong, however on this occasion I want to speak from the heart in sounding a much more positive note and do something we are far too reluctant to do, which is highlight how good we actually are and identify the massive cultural changes that I have seen over three decades of policing.

 

One thing that has remained constant throughout my service is that the police have always been the victim of unrelenting and uninformed criticism from those armchair critics who have no idea whatsoever about what being a cop actually entails. In response to such attacks we have over the years reeled with the blows and on occasions knee-jerked in our responses. Some of the changes that we have seen have been for the good and others less so. In our ever-changing world though, what has never altered, are the people who make up Greater Manchester Police. Any organisation, whatever its line of business, is only as good as the people who make it, because if you take them away all that is left are a lot of buildings, computers and ideas. Despite what some colleagues at senior levels may believe I am very firmly of the view that one thing that has never changed throughout my service is the fundamental decency of the people who make up GMP. Much emphasis has been placed upon diversity in recent years but in my view the police officers on the front line have always grasped it. I have seen this throughout my service and you will too. What has never changed is that the police officer who turns up to help when asked has one very simple objective and that is to look after a member of our community who needs us whatever their background may be. You are the only constant in our ever changing world.  

 

During my service I have had the opportunity to see policing in various parts of the UK and indeed on the continent and everything I saw reinforced the view that Manchester is a very special place and the relationship we have with our communities matches that. Nobody can deny that we have more than our fair share of problems, but whatever is thrown at us we are up to the challenge. If anyone were in any doubt about how we are valued by the people of Greater Manchester they need only to cast their minds back to the events of last year when they came out onto Deansgate to share our grief and show their gratitude. That kind of bond is not achieved by policing plans and corporate strategies, it has been built over decades by the men and women who make up the GMP who go out there and do the job and who could not care less what background somebody comes from when all they want is to treat people in the same way that they would want to be treated themselves. You can set up focus groups all day long and produce as many glossy brochures as you like, but it is the fundamental decency of people like you that drives GMP forward and that has forged that special link with the people of Greater Manchester.

 

There can be no better example of this than last month`s Pride March through the city centre. When I joined the job nobody would have ever dreamed of the city hosting such an event, let alone GMP playing such an integral part. As I marched through the city centre, watching an ACC trying to do hip hop, I took the time to look at the throngs of people lining the streets. Every float and every participant was applauded, but when the GMP contingent came along you could sense that there was a special cheer. As I walked I looked at the people lining the route I saw that they were not just young people who had recently been through a modern educational system that teaches them to value all forms of diversity, these youngsters were standing shoulder to shoulder with the pensioners of our city and construction workers who had downed tools to join in. These fellow residents of Manchester have lived in our city much longer than I have been in the job and when I joined GMP probably never have thought they would have been standing there with us on that day. The reason they were there though is that society has been on a journey and those people standing there cheering are real people who respect their police as role models and when they see us embracing diversity and treating people as they would want to be treated they will follow our lead and want to stand shoulder to shoulder with their local police force – and that don’t forget is each and every one of you.

 

It is with immense pride that I now retire from GMP and that pride is quite simply because I have worked with the fantastic people that make it what it is – thank you.

 

Kieran Murray