HUNDREDS of Scotland's new police recruits are starting life on the beat before completing their training.
Senior officers in Strathclyde, the nation's biggest force, are having to mobilise untrained probationers because there's no space for them at the national police college.
Between 50 and 100 officers are sent, routinely, on to streets across the w
est of Scotland after just a week of basic training – but under the strict supervision of experienced "tutor" constables.
Insiders last night said as many as 500 men and women would this year go straight to on-the-job training before getting a place at the national police college, Tulliallan in Fife.
The move comes after the Scottish Government released extra funding to meet its target of boosting overall police numbers by 1,000 – and clogged up the college with young officers.
"Tulliallan is bursting at the seams," said David Kennedy, the Strathclyde branch secretary of the Scottish Police Federation. "It's great the government has put up the money for the new officers. The problem is we need to make sure we have the infrastructure to train them."
Federation reps like Kennedy were initially wary of putting recruits on the streets, after just one week at Strathclyde's training centre at Jackton. Now the Federation, and the force, are so pleased with the results they will consider keeping this kind of on-the-job training when the current rush of recruits dries up.
Kennedy said: "The probationers are all well looked-after and have good officer safety training before they go out – always with very experienced officers. This is how we used to train police officers.
Maybe nowadays we focus too much on the academic skills and not enough on the kind of street sense police really need most, like how to speak to members of the public."
Chief officers yesterday stressed the new scheme, dubbed Operation Nelson, was helping to put officers straight into areas blighted by issues such as gang violence, which can be deterred simply by youngsters seeing officers on the beat.
Assistant Chief Constable Hamish Cormack said: "There has been no impact on divisional operations, quite the contrary, Operation Nelson has provided significant additional public reassurance and has targeted hotspots. It has had a very positive return in terms of policing outcome. It is also subject to ongoing evaluation which, indeed, may influence how all recruits are trained in the initial stage of their police career."
The force has hired a small fleet of vans to transport the trainees about the west of Scotland. Cormack stressed probationers weren't just twiddling their thumbs, dismissing as "complete nonsense" rumours the new recruits were not being kept busy. Cormack also stressed that only a small proportion of frontline officers had been transferred from the usual duties to mentor the recruits.
Inspector Ian Broadhurst, Strathclyde's training manager, said Operation Nelson was "highly structured" and backed by the Federation. He said: "They are happy with it and believe that it has been a positive experience for the recruits as well as their tutor officers."
Broadhurst said probationers going out on patrol before attending the police college were given extra training in officer safety and basic police law. They are also shown how to use the force's Airwave radios.
