a 21st Century Tale

I knew when I joined the Police Service (note Service, not Force – more about that later) that it wasn’t like The Bill.

In actual fact, I totally did appreciate that fact that the job I was about to embark upon was not like the TV. What I didn’t appreciate was just how different the reality was, and is…

Freewheel downhill seven, fast, blurred years later, and my partner and I are standing in a squalid, festering room, within a squalid, festering flat. A small skeletal Jack Russell wanders out of the bathroom across the hall and comes over to sniff my boots. It’s just done its business next to the toilet bowl. The irony isn’t lost on me, but it’s way too grim to come close to making me crack a smile.

Uncle and Aunty let’s call them, both sit in tatty, dusty armchairs. Uncle doesn’t speak, he glowers with ill-disguised contempt at me. Aunty punctuates every sentence with “officer”, a poor attempt at sincerity that she hopes we’ll buy, stop asking awkward questions and leave.

Uncle’s brother is wanted on a warrant. It’s normally a piddly matter, a non-payment of a £50 fine. It could have been sorted out quickly, with us either taking payment, or arranging to pop back in a day or so when he has got the cash.

We’re supposed to straight arrest him if he hasn’t got the money on his person, but in reality, it’s a Friday night and the cells will be filling up of their own accord over the next 2 days – the custody Sergeants don’t need the additional pressure at this time of the week. So we extract a promise to pay. Most people appreciate this and keep to their word, and all’s well. The one’s who don’t know that they’ve had their chance, and they’ll not have the same courtesy extended to them again. It’s not “by the book”, it’s the real world.

This time though, our target, the sibling of either Uncle or Aunty isn’t there, having not paid by the time he had promised to. He could be anywhere now, as he rents a series of places in the back of beyond, staying there until he realises we’ve sussed he’s living there.

Like many of his type, he has a constant; one residence, of sorts, that’s linked to him.

In this case, it’s his brother (full, half, step, who knows) who has taken on the additional mantle of caring for his off-spring as well as giving him a fixed abode. Seven children of ages ranging between about 2 and 9, who all have the same pallid complexion, jet black curly hair, dark brown eyes and streams of mucus running from their noses. Well known through the estate, they are particularly lawless, kicking footballs against cars, breaking windows, tormenting the local cats and dogs… according to Uncle they’re just kids being kids and hang anyone who says otherwise. It’s low level stuff, but it drives the aggrieved understandably to distraction.

Hang on, I didn’t behave like that though. Nor did my partner. Neither my brother, sister, my friends… actually anyone I knew when I was growing up.

We get a plethora of complaints about these kids, but all but one of them seems to be below the age of Criminal Liability, and as such we the cops are snookered. The most that’s been done has been referrals to the Social Work Department, but their intervention is questionable, as the kids are still here, there and everywhere.

Today’s a bit different though. It’s my first visit to this flat, and I know it hasn’t been visited for a couple of months. I also know that we’ve not really been invited in, more stepped over the threshold in a bid to take control of the situation. In short, there’s been no chance for Aunty and Uncle to tidy up (or, frankly, hide as much crap as possible).

So I look around at the sight of it all. Dog mess is in the hall and freshly in the bathroom. Mould is everywhere, coating the seal where the (apparently underworked) bath meets the filthy tiles. As I shift my weight onto my right foot, my left foot sticks to the carpet. It’s an effort to extricate it from whatever substance is causing it, but one that I scarcely try to hide. I’ve been in too many places now where you have to wipe your feet on the way out to worry about causing offence. Frankly, if they don’t care, why should I?

But, I do care about these kids. They’ve not asked to be put there, they’ve not had the good example set to them. They are a way for their parents to screw the Government for more cash. I guarantee that they will all, at some stage, be diagnosed with ADHD, cause trouble in school until they are permanently excluded (it was called expelled – maybe someone could enlighten me as to the reason behind the change in phrase), and carry on in the only way in which they know how. These kids have a one way ticket to the local gaol. They just don’t know it.
Anyway, I digress. I DO care about these kids. I care that they are being raised in squalor that would be excessive for Beirut. At least there it’s out of their control. I care on a number of levels. I would have hated to have been brought up in this mess. I couldn’t let my cat live in this mess. Nobody deserves to exist in this kind of mess unless they choose to. These kids are devoid of any form of choice.

I look at my partner and we share a silent moment. We’ve worked together for just over a month, but it’s more than enough. In the job, you have to get on with colleagues quickly, and trust them almost immediately. I spend more waking hours with my partner at work than I do with my wife at home. I know her thought processes, I know how she’s going to deal with a situation before it arises. It’s a silent, unspoken comfort for me, and equally I know it is for her too.

I make an excuse and leave the living room as she keeps speaking. Shreds of threadbare carpet line the soles of my boots. I step over the dog mess, head for the front door and call the Sarge. I paint a picture of what I’m seeing and request the duty Social Worker to get his or her backside round here yesterday. I have a decent skipper, and he gets right onto it. He’s covering his back, yes, but this particular sergeant is a good man. He’s got kids, principles and has 4 years to go. He’s way beyond sycophancy to get up the greasy pole, and in many ways he’s come full circle, back to doing the job for the right reasons – because people deserve better.

We wait until Social Work turn up, who, to their credit, take the kids, there and then. Many a time I have fallen out with the SWD’s inaction. Today they are a credit, and I realise that they want to make a difference. The kids are out of there and they are, as I discover later, re-homed.

As they are led, tearfully, out of the flat, I think about the residents who would have cheerfully seen them strung up. They simply don’t know do they? What goes on behind closed doors…

We speak in the car as we pull away from this sink-estate of gloom. Have we torn apart a family, or given the kids a chance? There’s only one answer. What awaits us back at the office now is a ream of paperwork. It’s a heavy thought but it’s worth it.

I know that Uncle and Aunty will spit every time they see us in future. So will the kids’ dad. I know too that we’ll be blamed for the break-up of this nuclear family. I am glad. I am glad that I was in a position to do something positive. It’s about taking decision, standing by them and enforcing laws, statutes and standards. Yes, we provide a service, but we are a Police Force, in my view. We provide a service, but we are a force.

It’s not the stuff of The Bill today, it’s nowhere near glamorous or fast paced enough, and it’s nothing like the role plays we did in training school.

I get home after the shift has finished – 3 hours to be precise, after completing all the various form, mostly seem to be in triplicate. My wife asks me about my day. I am shattered. She reads my lethargy in answering to be flippancy or disinterest in my job. Truth is, I’m so interested and bothered about it, I’m too tired to answer her.