Beat Officers

This episode meets beat bobbies tackling shoplifters, burglars, drunks, anti-social behaviour and intractable disputes between neighbours in Worksop, Nottinghamshire. The police find themselves dealing with the same people time and again. Like most officers, straight-talking Inspector Steve Cartwright is fed up with career criminals with no respect for the police or society and is sick of dealing with neighbourly disputes. 'Since when has dog poo outside your house been a police matter? We all joined to be cops, not social workers.' But upbeat PC Steve Porter, who came to policing after a career as a factory manager, feels he has found his calling dealing with people's problems: 'We spend our time sorting people's lives out and if I can make a difference, it's a job well done to me.' No-nonsense PC Christian Hurley has been on the beat team for three years and admits it was a culture shock when he first joined: 'Seeing needles and spoons with heroin in people's houses used to be shocking, but you get used to it... it's a case of wipe your feet on the way out.' Meanwhile, 26-year-old PC Dan Cooper, the youngest officer on Worksop's Neighbourhood Team, has had to adapt quickly to the reality of modern policing: 'Society's gone a bit by the wayside ain't it? We all get called offensive names, being spat at is the worst... you just have to detach yourself from it.'