Learning from the Police

Watching police men and women on the beat, dealing with disorder and antisocial behaviour, it is quite striking that they do know how to respond, how to position themselves, how to stand, what to say to deescalate a challenging situation.

This observation led to the question: would it be possible to provide training to ordinary citizens to enable us to assess an incident from the point of view of risk, and to respond, if we decide it is appropriate to do so, in a way that would minimise the risk to ourselves and to others and give us confidence that we can deescalate a situation and not make it worse? (read more)

Working with the Officer Safety Training Unit at the Metropolitan Police Training College a programme has been developed which adapts for ordinary citizens the safety training given to new police recruits.