The macho culture in the Police Service is forcing officers to push themselves too hard and undermining health and safety, according to the Police Federation of England and Wales.
There is a pressure on officers that the job has to be done “at all costs”, but it should not be at the expense of people’s lives, warned Paul Lewis, secretary of the ffederation’s health and safety committee.
Lewis said management and officers should receive training to give them more of an appreciation of how important health and safety is to help them put in place controls and measures that would complement the job.
He told Police Review magazine that controls would allow policing “to be carried out more effectively and efficiently with the risks reduced to as low a level as possible. That would help eradicate the macho culture”.
The federation has written to the Health & Safety Executive and the Association of Chief Police Officers outlining its concerns about the culture in the service and the level of health and safety training.
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