Police - Impact And Implications (Docu)
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CreativityTranscript
00:00Oh it will, the whole lot. Yeah, it could well affect the issue, you're quite right, of course it could.
00:209, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3
00:305, 4, 3, 2, 1
00:35That will all down the road.
01:01Oh I think that this particular programme will make a considerable difference to the outlook by not only this police force but other police forces on the press, television people and the public as regards to what is said and done in the future because there's never been anything like it before.
01:20And I think that Graef and Stuart will find great difficulty in maybe coming back to this force.
01:26Good evening, that was the view of one Thames Valley policeman of the series on the police which during the last 11 weeks has given a regular 10 million viewers an unprecedented insight into police methods and attitudes.
01:37It's a view not confirmed by opinion polls, 73% believing the series has not changed their view of the police one way or the other and 17% saying that the programmes had actually given them more confidence in the police.
01:51We'll talk about the polls later and we'll also be asking questions such as should the series have been made, how truthful was it and what effect if any will it have in the long run.
02:01With me in the studio to answer these questions are Chief Constable Peter Inbert of the Thames Valley Police who gave permission for the series to be made,
02:09Roger Graef, co-producer of the series with Charles Stuart, Roy Hattersley, Shadow Home Secretary, Harriet Harmon of the National Council for Civil Liberties and Eldon Griffiths, the Conservative MP who is Parliamentary Consultant to the Police Federation.
02:25First though let me tell you the conditions for filming that were agreed on between the Thames Valley Police and the BBC.
02:31In return for the complete access the BBC demanded, qualified by the right of every individual approach to say no, the police were given three guarantees.
02:40First before each screening to correct factual inaccuracies, secondly that personal and professional secrets be deleted and thirdly that the BBC would take account of police comment on fairness of presentation but yet have the last word.
02:54In the end three programmes were not shown, one because it concerned a juvenile, one because of excessive bad language and a third because one police participant didn't wish it to be shown.
03:05John Craven looks back over the series as it was transmitted and how press and public reacted.
03:12TV's candid camera presents the police as you've never seen them before.
03:17Well that's how the Daily Express previewed the police series which was to end up creating unprecedented press interest.
03:23Campaigns for and against the police and equally as much for and against the BBC were waged in television columns and some of the programmes made front page news starting with the first one.
03:35On New Year's Eve the support group kitted out with flak jackets and riot helmets was called in for a possible all out assault on a suspect's house.
03:43The man might have been armed and dangerous.
03:46Alright, alright I tell you what stand in the doorway and I'll come towards you then. Stand there, that's where I can see your hands. I'm just coming, I'm just coming.
04:00Go, go, go, go, go.
04:03Watch his window, watch his window.
04:06Good aim mate.
04:08It's alright, that's it, thank you very much.
04:12He's not stopping.
04:15Well done, well done Michael.
04:18You know what's about, it'll be explained to you shortly Mr Stimson.
04:23Donald Stimson, the suspect in this case instantly became the centre of a press row about television ethics as some papers reported inaccurately that the film had broken up his marriage.
04:34The next film again raised the question of privacy.
04:37Some of the press were shocked by Detective Brian Kirk's harrowing ordeal when he was stripped of CID status yet still allowed BBC cameras to be present to witness his distress.
04:48Prying eye and private shame said the mail.
04:51Well now two years later and just plain PC Kirk he's a respected copper on the beat.
04:57It is said, and let me make it very very clear to you because I shan't hold me punches, that it is felt that you have been dodging the work where aggravation is likely to be produced.
05:11And in fact it's got to the stage where some of your younger colleagues are saying about you that you are one of the old stages who are untouchable and no one has got the courage of their convictions or the strength of character to recommend that you be moved.
05:30Well the time has come that it is now happening today and in view of the reports that I've received, the conversations that I've had, I'm recommending that you be returned to uniform duties as soon as possible.
05:51What do you have to say about that?
05:53I'm just absolutely and utterly speechless.
06:02Police began to look as though it had the seeds of a soap opera when Brian Kirk appeared again in the next film, A Complaint of Rape.
06:11Rape was very much in the news. A rapist had been let off with a £2,000 fine instead of jail and his victim was accused of contributory negligence.
06:20And in Scotland the Crown Office was criticised for not pursuing the prosecution of a rapist.
06:25So with this background of public interest, some viewers who'd shown great sympathy towards Brian Kirk...
06:35Alright, back to...
06:38Police began to look as though it had the seeds of a soap opera.
06:43Police began to look as though it had the seeds of a soap opera when Brian Kirk appeared again in the next film, A Complaint of Rape.
07:01Rape was very much in the news. A rapist had been let off with a £2,000 fine instead of jail and his victim was accused of contributory negligence.
07:10And in Scotland the Crown Office was criticised for not pursuing the prosecution of a rapist.
07:16So with this background of public interest, some viewers who'd shown great sympathy towards Detective Brian Kirk the week before...
07:23...may have felt it disappear when they saw him as the interrogator in A Complaint of Rape.
07:30Listen to me. I've been sitting here 20 minutes, half an hour listening to you.
07:34Some of it's the biggest lot of bollocks I've ever heard. I can get very annoyed very shortly.
07:39One minute you're saying it's Coley, next minute you're saying it's the Midway.
07:42You pass, Coley. Park.
07:44What happened? I'm sick and tired of the ups and downs and the ins and outs.
07:48Some of this is better fairy tales than bloody Gretel can do.
07:54Now stop mucking us all about.
07:56I'm not mucking you about.
07:57I'm not saying to you as you're lying.
07:59Get rid of the fruitiness, get rid of all the beauty about it and let's get down to facts and figures.
08:03It's not beautiful at all, is it?
08:04Some of it is. All this crap about bus stops and numbers and blue and white tea towels to wipe myself down with.
08:10What the hell's gone on? If nothing's gone on, let's all pack it off and go home.
08:15The press and the public hotly debated whether that kind of grilling was out of the ordinary or part of regular police routine.
08:22Jean Rook in The Express called the police thick, unintelligent, ill-educated, foul-spoken.
08:29While Linda Lee Potter in The Mail accused the BBC of being professional exploiters who turned the subject of rape into titillating entertainment.
08:38The chairman of the Police Federation, Jim Jardine, wasn't happy either.
08:42This programme has done more harm to public relations between the police and the public,
08:47and certainly for people who could be wanting to go to a police station to complain about rape,
08:52than anything that's ever done in the last 60 years.
08:56But Peter Fiddick in The Guardian praised it for being in the rare category of programmes that have actually changed things,
09:03for the Thames Valley Police have been worried enough by it to look again at how they conduct such cases.
09:09And Mrs Thatcher expressed her concern in Parliament.
09:12The fame of Thames Valley Police force spread. They became the Monday night stars of television.
09:18He's not booking him guv, it's just another autograph.
09:21And this Smirnoff ad could almost be Brian Kirk.
09:24I wanted to become an actor, but luckily I joined the Thames Valley Police.
09:28The pop festival programme showed the drug squad at work.
09:40That's LSD. That's white star LSD.
09:45But it wasn't. If it had been, it would have been worth £25,000.
09:50But it turned out to be nothing more than a bag of macaroni.
09:53Both the drug buyers and the police had been conned.
09:56The subject of episode 5 was an old man found dead at the bottom of the stairs.
10:02The police's handling of the case of Mickey the Bricky upset James Murray of the Express,
10:07a consistent critic of the series. He called it a monstrous abuse of television.
10:12The abuse being that viewers were left with the thought
10:15that some of Mickey's fellow dossers were less witnesses than suspects.
10:22Is this everyone?
10:27I'm Chief Inspector Warren. I'm involved with this inquiry.
10:31You know that one of your colleagues is dead.
10:37At the moment, we've got the house sealed off.
10:41Now, we're not pointing the finger at any one of you,
10:44but what we've got to do is to talk to you again tomorrow morning.
10:49We can't allow you back to the house, so you've got nowhere to keep.
10:53So what we're going to do is accommodate you here tonight.
10:56Now, you're not under arrest or anything of that nature.
11:00You're being given accommodation. You'll have breakfast in the morning.
11:03What happened? You don't want us.
11:05Pardon? What happened? You don't want us.
11:07If you don't want us... You don't want accommodations.
11:09But, you know, we will give you that tonight.
11:13There's a 12-week training course during which new recruits
11:16are taught to deal with all sorts and conditions of people,
11:19sometimes with the help of amateur dramatics.
11:24Do you know what's in the boot, sir? Yes, mate.
11:26Could you tell us?
11:28Not a lot.
11:30Run, Ian! Run!
11:40Hey, what are you doing with my mate? Get off!
11:42That's my brother! That's my brother!
11:44That's not my brother!
11:46That's my brother!
11:48Don't touch him!
11:50Hey, let go of him!
11:52Let him go!
11:54Let him go!
11:56Let him go!
11:58Let him go!
12:00Let him go!
12:02Let him go!
12:04Let him go!
12:06Let him go!
12:08That's my brother. That's my brother.
12:10That's my brother.
12:12That's my brother, you struggling, weird officer.
12:15That's my brother.
12:17That's my brother.
12:19Right.
12:21You will find that when you deal with general people,
12:24if you deal with working-class people,
12:28and people who are generally found about,
12:31they do not mind all that much being arrested.
12:38They seem to accept that if they do something wrong,
12:42they are liable to end up back at the police station.
12:46However, certain classes of people and certain races,
12:52coloured people, for instance,
12:54take an instant dislike to being arrested.
12:57I don't know why, but when you try and arrest someone coloured,
13:01they go mad.
13:03Another frequent event for even the newest recruit
13:06is the theme of the next film, Robbery.
13:18Snowy, can you have a word with the attendant
13:21and get the best description as you can of the offenders, all right?
13:25And try and go over that vehicle again, will you?
13:28I'll get on to Reading and we'll get the manager or the keyholder down.
13:31Have you got the manager's phone number?
13:33He's on his way, is he?
13:35Yeah, OK. We'll get CID down as well.
13:38Burglars, redfaces and de Bret.
13:41Well, that's how the Telegraph described the next programme.
13:44Laura, Duchess of Marlborough, was in danger of being burgled
13:48and the police wanted to lay an ambush.
13:50But her houseguest, Sir Arthur Bryant,
13:52didn't have proof that the uninvited guests
13:55really were the police and the BBC,
13:57and he promptly turfed them all out.
14:01Don't worry about it, don't be concerned.
14:04Sir, the gentleman is quite right.
14:06He is. Of course he is. We're only worried about your safety.
14:09I said it was very rude to lock you out in the cold.
14:11No, don't be concerned about that.
14:13It seems to me an extraordinary thing that in a private house,
14:17without any warning from the police at all,
14:20a team of policemen should arrive, followed by a BBC team,
14:23who say they want to find out where everything in the house is.
14:26You're absolutely right, sir.
14:28Now, if you want to get an inspector or the local inspector up here or something,
14:31that's a very... This officer knows.
14:33We're only worried, madam, that that car will be seen from the road
14:39if they're doing... He's just going to move it there
14:41and come and speak to you, sir. Do you see what I mean?
14:45More mundane aspects of police work seen in the traffic film
14:49demonstrated our ambivalent attitude to the police.
14:52Wonderful when we need them at a crime or an accident,
14:55but not so welcome when they stop us for bad driving.
14:59Good evening, sir.
15:00Yeah, are we going to park our car like this, are we?
15:03Are we going to park your car like this, are we?
15:06No, definitely not, no, we're not.
15:08I'll tell you what, that was a little bit naughty,
15:10the way you came across the road, wasn't it?
15:12Well, I looked back. Huh? I looked back and looked forward.
15:15Oh, I know, you looked back and you looked forward.
15:17You had your left-hand indicator on, you know, it was lucky, really.
15:20I wanted to turn left.
15:22Why didn't you turn left, then, instead of just taking that one?
15:25I didn't know that I missed this restaurant.
15:27Yeah.
15:28Well, you know, making these silly little decisions on the road like that
15:32is when we start having accidents.
15:34If you've indicated to turn left, yeah,
15:37and you suddenly change your mind, stick your right-hand indicator on
15:40and come across here in the face of an oncoming vehicle, yeah,
15:45you know, we've got all the makings of an accident, really, haven't we?
15:48OK?
15:51Cell death, episode ten, was the case of a man who died in police custody.
15:56A drunk who apparently choked on his own vomit.
15:59In 1980, the year the series was filmed, 63 people died in custody in England.
16:05Were the police too keen on tidying up their evidence
16:08or just getting their facts clear?
16:10Right, well, now, can we make that perfectly clear?
16:15So, was he struggling or not?
16:18It's quite hard to describe, really.
16:20To be quite honest, I thought he was going to hit him.
16:23Well, that's great.
16:24That's... Well, I say it's great.
16:26I mean, the guy wasn't unconscious then.
16:28So, you're going to tell me, if you will, please,
16:30that he was virtually struggling
16:32and certainly you had that impression that he was going to try and lay one on him.
16:41So, I'll put another little thing there, OK, where you've said wave designs.
16:46The last film of the series showed a routine Saturday night's police work
16:50with punch-ups at closing time and inquiries pursued at the hospital.
16:54The hard grit and the humanity of the job,
16:57sometimes humorous, sometimes mundane.
17:00A recurring scene was a drunken driver taking the breathalyser test.
17:10Can I have the keys to the van, please?
17:13Not for a minute. You're being required to take a breath test,
17:16so that's the first thing you've got to do.
17:18If you fail to comply with taking a breath test...
17:20I don't apply... I don't fail...
17:22No, I'm just telling you this, so you listen to me.
17:24If you fail to take a breath test, which means inflating the bag
17:27in not less than ten and not more than 20 seconds in one single breath...
17:31No, you listen to me. If you fail to do that,
17:33you'll be liable to arrest for failure to take a breath test.
17:36So, take your deep breath and do it.
17:38If I'm not physically capable of it, I can get an inch of it.
17:41Why are you not physically capable of it?
17:43Well, I don't think so, no.
17:45Why's that?
17:47You're not refusing, are you?
17:49You've got your chance to blow up the bag.
17:59I do not recall, said the Guardian,
18:01the last time it seemed necessary to tune in every week
18:04to a documentary series.
18:06And that's certainly the way that a lot of Thames Valley policemen
18:09must have felt about it, and this is how one writer
18:12in the police officer's magazine summed up his feelings.
18:15I suspect that Tuesday mornings in Kiddlington,
18:18that's the police headquarters, have a new piquancy
18:21as the top brass try to reach a consensus view
18:24on whether E Division lost or won their previous night's episode.
18:29Well, that, of course, was a selective reminder
18:32of some of the highlights of the series.
18:34But what do the Thames Valley policemen think of the series now?
18:37We went to Reading Police Station just before the end of the series
18:41to speak to some of those who had appeared,
18:43including Joe Wise, a crime correspondent
18:45who's been covering the series and police affairs generally
18:48for the Reading Chronicle.
18:59Well, there have been two completely different reactions by the police.
19:02There's a very definite party line that says,
19:05we defend to the hilt our decision,
19:07it was brave and we were right to do it,
19:09and they'll stick by that.
19:11But ultimately, once they're off the record,
19:14they're all saying, I wish we had ever done it.
19:17We regret it and it's horrible and we dread every Monday night.
19:22Is there anything worse that can possibly come out of it?
19:25They think their image has become silch in the public eye.
19:30I think that's probably right as well.
19:41I think that's probably right.
20:00The reaction to the media is awful.
20:11Since the broadcast of the police programs, instructions have been given now that we don't
20:32give interviews to the press, or I've certainly been given instructions not to give interviews
20:35to the, with the press, unless they're tape recorded or a senior officer sits in on those
20:40interviews, which was something that hadn't taken place prior to the police programs or
20:44for me personally.
20:45A natural desire of program makers to catch an audience concerned some policemen.
20:58There was no way they were going to achieve what they set out to in the first place.
21:10Basically, there was no way they were going to achieve what they set out to in the first
21:17place.
21:20If they really showed what we do for 90% of the time, I think when they made it into a
21:25television program and looked at it, they would decide that it probably wasn't very
21:28good television viewing.
21:31And because of that, I think, I don't know what their reactions were, but I probably
21:36think that when they saw the way things actually happened, they decided that it would be better
21:41viewing to take the more out of the, out of the ordinary, hardly spectacular, but certainly
21:47the more out of the ordinary incidents and concentrate on those.
21:51Roger Grafe and Charles Stewart have made excellent entertainment, there's no two ways
21:54about that.
21:55And I think if you look at the Duchess film, that was shown on, the programs all went out
22:00after 10 o'clock, but all of a sudden, because that was quite good entertainment, there's
22:04no doubt about that.
22:05It went out instead of the last of the summer wine, so that tends to show that it was good
22:09entertainment and they saw it as such and scheduled it to go at a really peak time because
22:14it was, some of it was a really good laugh.
22:17You've got the Softly Softly, Zed Cars, the Sweeney, Kojak, all those programs, and in
22:24those programs, you've got professional actors.
22:26Now, I think the public has become used to professional actors.
22:32No lines are fluffed, and if the lines are, in fact, fluffed, then they start again.
22:37So not so with a fly-on-the-wall documentary technique at real police stations, so perhaps
22:42we suffer a bit from that, I think.
22:45Non-professionalism in the acting, no members of equity at a police station, and when people
22:50see real policemen acting rather less well than professional actors, then, of course,
22:56perhaps they, we go down in their estimation.
22:59Perhaps that could only be said of the unfortunate Brian Kirk, who hardly found it to his advantage.
23:06Officially said, I think that's human nature by the...
23:14Some individuals have suffered greatly, for example, PC Kirk.
23:23He's been subjected to a lot of criticism.
23:27Whether that was right or not, it's not for me to say here, but his personal life has
23:34been affected a great deal.
23:37He's been tortured, if you like, with telephone calls.
23:43He's had nasty letters, and in fact, he had the other day a piece of poetry sent to him,
23:51which was not particularly nice at all.
23:55In the end, what effect do the police think the series will have on the public's attitude
23:59to them, and indeed their own attitude to themselves?
24:04It's shown policemen to be very, very human, to be there doing a job, and yet we're culled
24:15from the public, taken from the public.
24:18There is an image sometimes, an unfortunate image, that policemen are just poured into
24:22a mould.
24:23The mould is cracked, and a little man trots out on the street with a helmet on, because
24:28that's how the public generally see them.
24:29Well, they've seen them at work, they've seen them at play, and they've seen them to be
24:33human.
24:34To find out what the public at large think of the series, here's John Craven with the
24:38opinion polls.
24:42We commissioned two public opinion polls, one national by Gallup, and one in the Thames
24:47Valley area by Moray.
24:49Nationally, 73% said the series had made no difference to their confidence in the police,
24:54and 2% said they didn't know.
24:56But the other quarter had been influenced by a series which didn't set out to make any
25:01judgments.
25:0217% said they now had more confidence in the police, 8% said they had less.
25:08In the Thames Valley area, 70% have been unaffected, again 2% didn't know.
25:1313% have increased confidence, and 15% have decreased their confidence.
25:19Asked whether they thought the series would help or damage relations between the police
25:24and the public, nationally, 43% said it would make no difference.
25:2831% of the people said it would help, 21% said it would damage police-public relations.
25:35That's 1 in 5.
25:36And 6% didn't know.
25:38In the Thames Valley area, confidence in the police has slightly increased.
25:43When NOP questioned people there in January, 39% said they had a great deal of confidence,
25:4946% a fair amount, 11% said they had little, and 4% none at all.
25:57I asked the same question by Moray last week, 46% said they had a great deal of confidence,
26:0341% a fair amount, 10% said they had little, and 2% none at all.
26:09On one programme, a complaint of rape, people are clear that the police did not behave well at all.
26:15In the Thames Valley area, just over half were dissatisfied with the way the police handled the case.
26:20Nationally, two-thirds thought the police behaved badly.
26:24After the programme in January, a third of people in the Thames Valley area thought the case was an exception.
26:30By March, half thought that, which is also the view nationally.
26:34And asked whether they approved of the BBC showing the series, nationally, 80% approved.
26:40And in the Thames Valley area, 86% approved,
26:4356% saying that the series had taught them something about the police.
26:48And having learnt about the police, 86% in the Thames Valley area said they would like to see other institutions treated in the same way,
26:56most popular by far for scrutiny with the social services.
27:01Mr M, but now that the series is over and the shouting has died down,
27:05are you glad or are you sorry that you gave your blessing to it?
27:09Well, I wouldn't say that I'm glad that I gave my blessing to it.
27:12I would say that I'm relieved that it's all over,
27:15and I think it was right that we allowed the cameras in and we showed ourselves as we've been seen to be.
27:22It's been a traumatic experience without any doubt at all,
27:25and I believe I described it at one time as looking at your own x-ray plates
27:30and perhaps being surprised at what you find there.
27:33I would be even more dramatic now.
27:35I think it's been like open heart surgery and perhaps finding that you only went in for ingrown toenails.
27:40It's really been that dramatic.
27:43But I think it's right that we did it.
27:46I'm glad that it's over.
27:49I'm glad that we can now look back at it,
27:51but I think it's very, very important that we look at it in the whole context.
27:54And this is how I see the public seeing it now,
27:57and I'm frankly delighted that it's increased the confidence that the public have in their police force.
28:02I didn't think it was at all possible to increase that confidence.
28:05We're running at such a high level anyway,
28:07but if we are to believe what's been shown just now...
28:10When you say we, you mean the Thames Valley or the police generally?
28:13The police generally, and I think that's very, very important.
28:16We're just one small part of the police service in this country,
28:19and I think it is important that the public do have confidence in their police force.
28:23And if we've done something to contribute to that, well, I'm glad of that.
28:26Do you have any reservations? Is there any one thing that you, if you had the time again, you wouldn't do?
28:31No. I do have reservations about the whole series,
28:35in as much as I was disappointed that in an area where we have something like 30,000 detections in one year,
28:42which is pretty high, that there appeared to be at one time
28:46a series of what we could describe as less than successful operations.
28:50And I was disappointed that we came over apparently in an unprofessional way.
28:55And I feel partly responsible for that, because I've subjected these officers
29:00to the trauma of having the cameras looking over their shoulders,
29:04and that's not an easy task when one is dealing with, as we've seen over the series,
29:08without maligning them at all, occasionally the flotsam and jetsam of life
29:12which floats through police stations, and the officers deal with it to the best of their ability.
29:17Roger Grafe, what do you feel looking back on the series now?
29:20Would you do anything differently to what you did?
29:23Well, there were lots of occasions when we would have liked to have had cameras loaded and ready
29:27and be able to film some of the successes perhaps that Peter Embers talked about.
29:32But in fact, I think the figures in the polls are very interesting
29:36compared to the press reaction that was quoted, especially.
29:39Because the polls are telling us that ordinary people do come out of this
29:43pleased with what they're seeing, and are able to incorporate the ups and downs of real life,
29:49which is what we were dealing with, perhaps better than both sensitive policemen
29:53and certain critics have done.
29:56And especially if you take somebody like P.C. Kirk, who at the time was vilified,
30:00really very roughly, for what he did.
30:03And yet even Nancy Banks Smith in The Guardian said that she thought in that episode
30:07everybody emerged from it with humanity.
30:09And we went to Brian's house two weeks later and found him with 50 letters
30:13from people around the country, only three or four of which were critical,
30:16and lots of others praising his courage for allowing the cameras to witness his appearance.
30:21Yes, but this was an inadequate man by any standards.
30:23And you're on record as saying that you didn't want to make a successful film
30:27at the expense of anyone's humiliation.
30:29Surely Brian Kirk was, to some extent, humiliated.
30:32No, I don't agree with that, actually. I think that he emerged from it with dignity.
30:35And indeed, again, I brought Nancy's review in because it's so important.
30:38She said Kirk is exactly the sort of P.C. one would like to meet on the street.
30:41And he's doing extremely well in Pangborn at the moment.
30:44It may be that in that he clearly made a mistake,
30:46but his style is something that not everybody reacts to the way you did.
30:50I really don't accept that.
30:51I'll put one thing to you about him before we leave him, and that is this.
30:54Was his inadequacy...
30:56That's your word. I don't think it's mine.
30:58Well, it's struck a lot of people that he was inadequate.
31:01And was not, in a way, part of that inadequacy something that you ought to have protected?
31:06Well, that presumes something that I don't accept, which is that he was inadequate.
31:10As far as I'm concerned, what we saw were people doing their best in difficult circumstances.
31:15We don't always approve of what they did.
31:17I was not sitting in judgment on anybody in that series, and that's very important.
31:21What I was saying, and I think it's the lessons for television and for other institutions,
31:26I hope will be learned in the longer run than the immediate morning after,
31:31is that the public are able to come out of this exercise with confidence,
31:35increased confidence, if anything, in the police,
31:37despite having seen all these things which people seem so shocked by.
31:40And if the cameras are allowed in with no holds barred and the kind of freedom we had,
31:44it may be a positive exercise, but you won't know it until it's over.
31:47One last question before we move on to more general things.
31:50Did you get permission, I know you got permission from the police before you screened the program,
31:54did you get permission from the ordinary public who took part?
31:58Yes, we got it in a number of ways, actually.
32:00In any specific interview, the consent of each person was necessary,
32:05as well as each detective, each civilian, if you like, they had to be asked in advance.
32:10You asked everybody who took part?
32:12Anyone who was interviewed, brought into the police station and interviewed in the interview room, yes, they were asked.
32:17In other cases, because we guaranteed not to interfere with the police work,
32:21we couldn't stop an arrest and say, by the way, we're from the BBC.
32:24But we never hid the camera.
32:26Therefore, as did happen, if someone objected to being filmed, they said so,
32:31and we would say who we were, often they thought we were police crews,
32:34and when they found out we were the BBC, they said yes.
32:37Did you ask the girl who complained of rape?
32:39Absolutely, indeed.
32:40Did you show her the screening?
32:41No, we offered that to her through her mother, and her mother declined on her behalf.
32:45But we were asked to leave and invited back on three separate occasions during that by the girl herself.
32:52Right, I'd just like to get on if I could, because we've got a lot to get through.
32:57Mr. Inman, I'd like you just to know, while we're on this question of the girl who complained about rape,
33:01what did your officers know about this girl before they did the interview?
33:06Yes, this is one of the difficult things when one has the constraints of filming and of time,
33:12that the officers were undoubtedly, so far as I could see, subjective rather than objective.
33:17And they, of course, saw her come into the police station,
33:20and that's the sort of thing which can't be seen by the cameras, or wasn't seen by the cameras.
33:26They could see her face when she was...
33:28No, I was asking you, what did they know about her history before she came in?
33:32Well, they would have known something about her history before they had started the question,
33:37without any doubt at all, because they were officers from that area.
33:40And, if I could say so in the kindest possible way, the girl wasn't unknown to the police station.
33:45Yes, she'd made complaints before, has she not, which weren't substantiated, is that right?
33:50Yes, that is so.
33:52But, of course, that shouldn't persuade them to be insensitive to the complaints at that particular time.
33:57No, but what I'm asking is this, that if they had not had this information,
34:02they might perhaps have questioned her in a rather different way.
34:04Oh, I'm sure that that's so.
34:06I think we must all be somewhat subjective to the inquiry which we're conducting at that time,
34:11without any doubt at all, yes.
34:13So it wasn't really a typical case, this?
34:15I would say it's grossly untypical.
34:17And, indeed, this is one of the reservations that I had about it,
34:21not wishing to change it at all.
34:23And I was very disappointed that we should see a case of a rape investigation like that.
34:28And I'm gratified that we've had so many letters from ladies
34:32who've been subjected to this terrible crime,
34:35congratulating Thames Valley Police on the way that they've been treated,
34:38and drawing it to our attention.
34:39Do you have a comment on that, Harriet Harman?
34:40Yes, I do.
34:41I think it's totally inadequate for Mr Inbert to say whether or not their approach was subjective or objective.
34:47Their approach to that woman who was saying that she'd been raped
34:51and came into the police station as an alleged victim of rape,
34:54their approach to her was atrocious.
34:56And you wouldn't say to somebody who came into the police station who alleged they'd been mugged,
35:01well, her, we know about you, you've been mugged before,
35:04and therefore you somehow must have brought it on yourself.
35:06I think that it's regrettable that it's not until a TV programme shows on the screen
35:12the disgraceful way that police officers treat rape victims
35:15that people really accept the complaints that have been made by women's organisations
35:19and by many women over the years.
35:21And I think it's a great shame that instead of Peter Inbert saying,
35:24yes, I can see that we're doing the wrong thing in the way we treat rape victims,
35:28he's now trying to slide out of it.
35:30I'd hoped you were going to say you have a good training programme.
35:34You see, here is exactly the problem.
35:36Harriet Harman has concluded from this particular incident,
35:41which I think most of us regret,
35:43and which the Chief Constable has certainly said he disapproved of,
35:46she goes on to say, until the television cameras arrived,
35:50no-one knew how police officers treat all complainants of rape.
35:55The point is, this is an atypical, unrepresentative case,
36:00and the unfortunate thing about the series, which I generally approve,
36:05is that it has suggested, by selecting a number of incidents,
36:09that they are in every respect typical, representative, normal.
36:13They are not. And that is the whole point of the issue.
36:16Do you want to say anything on the rape thing, Roy?
36:18Not on the rape point specifically, but I want to use it as an example
36:20of something I have to say more generally.
36:22Right, we'll come back to that in a moment.
36:23I think we'll just leave the rape, but before we do it,
36:25would you like to say anything further about it?
36:27Yes, I think Harriet Harman is herself being subjective
36:30rather than objective about this,
36:32and I think that when she says that I'm trying to slide out of it, I'm not at all.
36:37I'm glad that I've seen that interview about the case of rape,
36:41because I think that we can then examine it and we can say to ourselves,
36:44well, if it happened that once, how many more times has it happened,
36:48and we can be that much more careful.
36:50And that's one of the good things which has come out of this programme,
36:53that we can really have a look at it in depth.
36:55Just one last thing to ask you.
36:56Did it strike you that that woman who was complaining about rape
37:00really had been raped?
37:04I mean, did it strike you that...
37:06Let me say that I was disturbed by the interview,
37:11because there was a lady who was apparently being interviewed by herself,
37:16and it would have been better had her mother or father been there.
37:19I think that they came to the right conclusion,
37:22but I think they came to the right conclusion for the wrong reasons.
37:24Good, thanks very much. I'd like to move on now.
37:26Roy Hattersley, Shadow Home Secretary,
37:29and therefore an officer which is a police authority,
37:33what did you learn from the series?
37:35Well, first of all, let me say I'm not at all surprised
37:37that it improved the police's reputation,
37:39because I think it did in a way squash the more vulgar criticism of the police,
37:44which is they're moving towards a semi-military status,
37:48that they're detached, that they are gratuitously brutal,
37:53that they're inconsiderate about human feelings and civil liberties.
37:56I think the police came out of it looking enormously human.
37:59My concern is that in some ways they came out of it
38:02looking rather too human in two ways.
38:04One is that the people who run the police in the area,
38:07I think, obviously, made some errors about how the police are deployed and used.
38:12There was an entire programme where I think 18 officers
38:16were spending two evenings protecting the property of a duchess.
38:20I don't think we've seen 18 officers in my constituency
38:23on any one occasion during the last 20 years.
38:26And the more sophisticated question about the programme is
38:28does it show that police time and manpower are being used
38:32in the most sensible and most serious way?
38:34Secondly, I think it raises another disturbing question about competence,
38:38about the competence of some people recruited
38:40and the competence of the training they receive.
38:43If you take PC Kirk and his colleague cross-examining the rape victim,
38:47though it'll be very unpopular with many viewers,
38:50my complaint about them was not innate brutality.
38:53I just regard it as a wholly incompetent interview.
38:56Two men who were really not up to that job were carrying out that job,
39:00as a result of which the young lady suffered a great deal more
39:03than it was decent to let her suffer.
39:05And I don't think the programme raises any questions
39:07about police humanity and decency.
39:09I do think it raises some questions about competence and organisation.
39:13Would you like to come back on that, Mr Inwood?
39:15Yes, I would, on two points, if I may.
39:17One about the competency of the officers
39:19and the other about the 18 officers protecting the duchess.
39:21I think what we must understand is that they're not protecting a duchess
39:25or her property.
39:26They're trying to catch some very aggressive villains
39:29who've been attacking property and people in that particular area.
39:32And, of course, they were successful later on.
39:35On the question of the competency of officers
39:37who are interrogating that lady, and it was an interrogation,
39:42yes, we need more training,
39:44but until you give us more officers, we can't have more training.
39:47If we take them away to train them, you won't have the officers there.
39:50Could I make the point about the 18 officers protecting a duchess?
39:54They were very aggressive individuals who were going to make that attack.
39:58Absolutely no doubt about that.
40:00And if we'd had any less, we could well have ended up with murder.
40:04And I think it was right to have those 18.
40:07Didn't look right on the films, of course,
40:09but we don't see the whole picture.
40:11Roy?
40:12Well, I don't think the problem is quite answered by the Chief Constable,
40:16if I may say so.
40:17I know that if there were numerous additions to the police strength,
40:21the police force of this country would be able to do all the things
40:24that everybody wants them to do.
40:26But in a democracy, in a democracy which is short of funds,
40:29there are going to be less policemen available
40:31than each Chief Constable would like to see.
40:34The real question is how the limited resources are used.
40:36And I still raise the question as to whether that is the best way
40:39to use short manpower when other things are happening,
40:43which the citizens of the towns, at least, within the area,
40:46the people who are worried about smaller break-ins,
40:48the people who are worried about muggings,
40:50who want to see policemen walking along the streets on their beat,
40:53would regard as much more important.
40:55And I think the question is reproduced again with, I think, Programme 2,
40:58where there was a man in the house suspected of having a weapon
41:02and I think turned out to have a household appliance, not a weapon.
41:05But that's, in a sense, irrelevant
41:07because the police didn't know at the moment.
41:09But nevertheless, it was a massive police operation.
41:11And I think we have to ask the question
41:13whether policing is moving towards this sudden, massive,
41:16quick-response operation
41:18rather than using the available resources more thinly, walking about.
41:22I think that's a great question of policing for the next five years.
41:24Eldon Griffiths?
41:25Indeed, it is a question, but I think it also illustrates
41:28the unwisdom of allowing politicians to take decisions
41:32as to how the police should deploy their resources.
41:34Of course, if you look at the programmes,
41:36it may well appear that there was an excessive number of men there
41:40and Roy Hattersley has reacted to it.
41:42But what he doesn't know, neither do I,
41:45is what knowledge the chief officer of police
41:48and the men on the spot had
41:50about the record of violent attacks that had been made
41:53by this particular gang
41:55and therefore they sought to tackle the gang
41:57where they were most likely to catch them.
41:59Now, it is the surrounding information
42:02that any chief officer at any time has
42:04that must determine how he deploys his resources.
42:07And that is why it's so important,
42:09despite this television programme,
42:11to leave the operational decisions with the chief officer
42:14and not to allow politicians or television producers
42:17to get in there and tell the police how to do their business.
42:20Harriet Harman?
42:21I'd like to just take up a point on training,
42:23which both Mr Hattersley and Mr Inbert have referred to.
42:26It's not just the amount of training the police get,
42:28but the quality of training they get.
42:30And we've just seen on that clip from the training programme
42:33that the police officer is being trained
42:36that black people are likely to go mad when they're arrested.
42:39Now, are you worried about that,
42:41or is it any surprise that the police are accused of being racialist?
42:45I mean, training should be used
42:47to try and get rid of those racialist attitudes,
42:49not to reinforce them.
42:50And again, I think the programme's been very revealing
42:53and has borne out a lot of complaints that are made.
42:55Mr Inbert?
42:56Yes, it has borne out that sort of thing.
42:59But I wasn't at all surprised to hear that.
43:02I was rather sad to hear it.
43:04But indeed, I think that shows the inhibitions
43:07that those officers are working under
43:09when the cameras are filming them.
43:11I would say that that's exactly what that showed at that particular time.
43:15If I could take up Roy Hattersley's point, if I may,
43:18so far as the second programme.
43:20In fact, it was the first programme when there was the siege situation.
43:23And Eldon Griffiths follows this
43:25by saying about the knowledge which police have
43:28when they are taking up one of those operations.
43:32In that case there, as we heard that man himself say
43:37that he had a conviction for possessing a firearm without a certificate
43:41and he had spent two years in prison because of that.
43:44And I think if we look carefully at that statement,
43:47one doesn't get two years imprisonment for not having a firearm certificate.
43:51And I think one ought to look a little bit more closely
43:53about what actually happened that night.
43:56There we have a man who has allegedly, according to his wife,
44:00shot the dog, going to shoot her,
44:02and we know that he has this conviction
44:04and we find it out from his own mouth later on.
44:07It's just about six years ago when a local sergeant was killed in the Midlands
44:13when he went to a house under very similar circumstances
44:16and he was shot by a shotgun.
44:20He was followed by the constable and the constable was then shot dead.
44:24And I think that our record, certainly within Thames Valley,
44:27stands examination that in the 13 years since we were formed
44:31we have not used a firearm in anger
44:33but we've resolved many, many, many firearms incidents.
44:37And I think Eldon Griffiths is quite right
44:39that it's got to be left to the operational judgment
44:41as the man in charge at that particular time.
44:43Can we go back to the training point?
44:45Sorry, I'd like to move on, Roy, if I could, too.
44:47We've got rather a lot to get through.
44:48I'd like to move on to you, Harriet Harman, and ask how the series struck you.
44:51I believe you have one or two observations to make.
44:54Well, yes, from the civil liberties aspects
44:56there are two particularly telling things.
44:58The first is the number of drunks that the police are dealing with.
45:01Now, some ten years ago it was accepted by the government
45:04that the police are not the right people for dealing with drunks.
45:07They should be taken to detoxification centres
45:10and they'd be properly supervised and properly looked after
45:13by people trained to deal with drunk people.
45:15And perhaps if that had been the case, that young man might never have died.
45:19The trouble is successive governments have failed to put the money in
45:22to set these detoxification centres up.
45:25I think really this series, these programmes underline
45:28that really that must be done.
45:30The police are the wrong people to deal with drunks.
45:33And the second point is a very serious problem.
45:35It's the question of the complete lack of safeguards for suspects in the police station.
45:40We saw people being interrogated, very vulnerable people in some cases,
45:44people who were drunk, people who were young,
45:46people who were suffering from shock,
45:48and it being alleged against them, sometimes very serious offences.
45:52And yet in no cases during those interrogations
45:56were people allowed to see a solicitor or was a solicitor present to advise them.
46:00In fact, in one case, somebody asked twice to see a solicitor and that was refused,
46:04which I think is probably a fragrant breach of the judge's rules.
46:07And in another case, a young person asked to telephone his mother and again was refused.
46:11And if the rules to protect suspects are completely ignored,
46:15they're not going to be observed by the police.
46:18Can I just make one final point, which is I'm not talking about something technical.
46:22These rules are there to ensure that innocent people don't end up
46:26confessing to things they haven't committed and therefore being innocently convicted.
46:30Thank you, Harriet Harman.
46:32But that is a point which I think struck many people, certainly struck me.
46:35I think in the robbery film, I think it was Mr Holmes, who got three years,
46:39he asked if he could have a solicitor, but the detective said no, you can't.
46:43Yes, that's right, and it's not, as Harriet Harman says,
46:46a fragrant breach of the judge's rules.
46:49There was another case where, in fact, it wasn't a robbery,
46:51where it was the siege man and he wasn't allowed to see his solicitor either.
46:55The siege man, in fact, did see his solicitor and so did the other man.
46:59Only after they'd been interrogated.
47:01Yes, that's right.
47:03Because if the police officers think that it's going to interfere with their questioning,
47:09then indeed they can say no, but they've got to justify it afterwards.
47:12And not only have I got to know why they've said no,
47:14but so have Home Office got to know why they've said no.
47:16And if indeed that officer cannot justify that, then obviously we would take some action.
47:21What are the grounds for justification?
47:23If it's going to interfere with the questioning.
47:28And indeed, in many, many cases it does.
47:31But I think there is a specific matter that I think arises from these programmes.
47:35A lot of people are arguing now that the best way of guaranteeing the rights of a suspect
47:40when he's being questioned by the police, of course, is to put it on videotape or audio tape.
47:45I think what this programme has demonstrated is the very great difficulty of doing that.
47:50If you have a drunk or some person who is in no command of his own language,
47:57he may, while his interview is being filmed, as this series did film in some cases,
48:02he may make all kinds of remarks about innocent third parties who've got nothing to do with the case.
48:08And then that tape could conceivably be made available in the court and damage the third party.
48:13It follows that the tape would have to be edited.
48:15That is rather a different point, Mr Griffiths.
48:17What I think the public are much more interested in actually at the moment
48:22is this question of if they're taken into a police station suspected of something
48:25and asked for a solicitor, they may not get one.
48:28Well, they may not get one, but the chances are that they will get one
48:32because in most cases the solicitor is of assistance both to the police and to the suspect.
48:37And I would like to take up that point.
48:39Harriet Harman said about people confessing to crimes which they haven't committed.
48:43There's nobody who detests that more than the police officer.
48:47There's nothing worse than getting a confession from somebody who's innocent.
48:51And that complicates the whole picture.
48:54There is nothing worse than that.
48:56And if one can prevent that by having a solicitor,
48:58then the first thing we should do is to have a solicitor there.
49:01Well, I'm very glad to hear that.
49:02And I think that it would be very good that if in future Mr Inbeck made a directive to the officers in his force
49:07that in every case possible a solicitor should be present.
49:10And although you say it normally does happen, in 100% of those...
49:13That is so.
49:15But is it not also so, Mr Inbeck, that if you do have a solicitor too early,
49:19you may not get the truth out of a man which you might get without the solicitor?
49:23That's very true, but I think most officers realise the advantage of having a solicitor there,
49:31but they're also experienced enough to know the disadvantages sometimes to the person concerned.
49:37There was another point that Harriet Harman made earlier about training.
49:43And I think we ought to come back to that.
49:45That's one important point of the police philosophy,
49:49that the more training and the better quality training that we do have,
49:53the better police service that you're going to have.
49:55But you can, frankly, only get a pint out of a pint pot.
49:58You can't get a quart out of it.
50:00Right. Mr Griffiths, what, looking at the series as a whole, did you think about it?
50:07I think it was right to screen it.
50:09I think in general it has been helpful to police-public relations
50:13because it's shown the human face of the police service, foibles and all.
50:18I regret very much the many things that the series left out.
50:21What really does concern the public, in my view at the moment,
50:25are things like muggings and murders and violence against the person.
50:29They were not properly shown, nor the great work that the police do in dealing with them.
50:35Equally, public order, riots, pickets...
50:38Is there a lot of that going on in Thames Valley, to your knowledge?
50:41Indeed. Well, but you see, the point is, although you were dealing with Thames Valley,
50:44the thing has been projected as if it were a proper expression of the police service as a whole.
50:49I don't think so, has it?
50:51The reality is that the BBC chose to exemplify the police in this particular way.
50:57And I must say that riots, pickets and those things were left out, as indeed was terrorism.
51:02Now, to that extent, it's not a general criticism.
51:05It is simply to say that what was shown was the truth, but very much part of the truth.
51:10Yes, I don't... We'll let Roger Grave answer this.
51:12Yes, actually, that description is one I would adhere to.
51:14I agree with everything you've just said, and that's what we've been saying all along,
51:17that it is only part of the truth.
51:19We claim no comprehensiveness, no definitiveness.
51:22This is simply an attempt to convey a series of revealing, hopefully,
51:26insights into life in a police station that is reasonably typical of most of the country.
51:31That was the decision.
51:32We don't claim absolute typicality for any of it, but it's reasonably so.
51:36You left out a lot.
51:37Of course we did. We left out corruption, we left out brutality, we left out racism,
51:41we left out all sorts of negative things for the police,
51:43as well as these difficult issues that you've raised.
51:46We know that, and what we hope we've done is establish a kind of beachhead
51:49that is closer to the truth than the previous attempts.
51:54That's all we're claiming.
51:56Roy, did you feel anything left out?
51:58Well, of course things were left out, and that is the problem that Elton Griffiths rightly describes.
52:03If you're going to have a series of television snapshots, which is what these were,
52:07then in between the snapshots are parts of life, and sometimes very boring parts of life.
52:13There was a sergeant on the station desk saying, of course, what we spend most of our time on.
52:18Nobody would bother to watch on a Monday evening,
52:21and that is the problem of allowing a service like this to be filmed.
52:24However, I'm sure the Chief Constable's right in saying that allowing it to be filmed was a wholly good thing,
52:29because, as I said right at the beginning,
52:31I think some of the more vulgar myths about the police have been exploded.
52:34But I hope the programme can be used, not just by one force but by others,
52:38to look at themselves and think about the more general criticisms,
52:42whether there ought to be a general rule which says solicitors must be made instantly available,
52:47whether what Lord Scarman said about officers exhibiting racist tendencies ought to be put into operation,
52:53or whether it ought to be forgotten, as the Home Secretary suggests.
52:56I hope very many police forces will think of the programme,
52:59not as an absolute description of Thames Valley in action,
53:03but a number of examples from which we can all benefit.
53:06I think the force has got a great deal to be congratulated for on allowing that to happen.
53:09Can I just make one point on this question of solicitors?
53:12It's very difficult to get a solicitor at two o'clock in the morning,
53:15and we've got to look at the reality of the situation,
53:18much as we would like them to be there,
53:20but we can't put off the interrogation of a suspect until nine o'clock when the solicitor comes.
53:24The man's problem wasn't that the solicitor wouldn't come, it was that he wasn't allowed to ask for him.
53:27He did ask for him, and indeed he came, but of course it's not shown on the film.
53:31Roger?
53:32We corrected that. The omission of the solicitor that was asked for in the robbery,
53:35you asked to be corrected, and you did correct it.
53:37I don't think anyone knew that he was the solicitor.
53:39I saw him in the background, but I don't think people realised he was the solicitor there.
53:42What I wanted to say to you was that what you've just said is what we would like to see happen,
53:46which is lessons drawn from this, and congratulations not only to you,
53:50but to the individual officers and the members of the public
53:52who had the courage to allow their experience to be shared,
53:56and there hasn't been enough of that in my view.
53:58Roger, the public opinion polls found that the public liked this kind of cinema verite,
54:04and the next thing they wanted to see was one on the social services,
54:07which I suppose is one of the things that hits them most personally.
54:11Can you see one being done on the social services?
54:14Definitely, but it needs the consent of everybody concerned.
54:17I think that's what we've learned, is that the people in it must be really completely aware
54:23of what they're doing and feel good about it afterwards.
54:26The policemen who've said yes, the members of the public who've said yes, were given that opportunity,
54:30but I think all of us were surprised by the intensity of the press reaction.
54:33Would there be enough drama in the social services to make a film about that?
54:37Yes.
54:38In your view?
54:39Our experience is that life is continually interesting, and you don't need to soup it up to enjoy it.
54:44Eldon Griffiths and Roy Hattersley, if cameras can go into the police stations and tell us about life there,
54:49why can't they go into Parliament?
54:51I've no objections to cameras going into Parliament,
54:54and I'm delighted that the House of Commons, which, after all, is our national legislature,
54:59has control of the cameras, just as we have control of Hansard,
55:03but I say this, Mr Kennedy, I hope that before that happens,
55:06that we will be allowed to put on a cinema verite of the BBC.
55:11I'm all for cameras going in. I've always voted for it.
55:13I'll take the rest of the terms of my police force.
55:15Thank you all very much indeed, and good night from us here.
58:52.
58:57.
59:02.