S01 - E18 - Jack and the London Police

Hey, in today's episode Rich speaks again with his friend Jack who currently works for the London Police. They talk about what it is like to be a police officer in one of the world's major cities and the type of crime that exists in London.

S01 - E18 - Jack and the London Police

Full intermediate level ESL podcast transcript

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Rich: Hi, Jack, how are you? 

Jack: Good, good. 

Rich: Excellent. Welcome back. We're in for another fun episode today. Only today, we're not talking about the army. We're talking about your new career, which is in the police, right? 

Vocab: Career - noun. an occupation or profession, especially one requiring special training, followed as one's lifework.

Jack: That's right. Yeah. 

Rich: So, similar question to the one we started with last time. How and why did you join the police? So, for those people who haven't listened to the last episode. It was a great episode, we talked a lot about your army career. So you came out of the army, what year? 

Jack: 2016...15, 2015. 

Rich: 2015. And then you decided to join the police Jack. So, how and why? 

Jack: So, when I was in the army in 2014.  In the army, I had to get a one year's notice to get out.

So during the one year, I basically applied for the metropolitan police, which is in London. I applied there,  went through the steps, assessments and I joined the police force. The reason why I joined the police force, I believe it was a direct career chain. So from... I'm going from one establishment, which is a discipline functional you know.. it's quite disciplined and there are steps and there is, it's an establishment, you know? 

Rich: Yeah. It's a big institution…

Vocab: Institution -  An institution is a social structure in which people cooperate and which influences the behavior of people and the way they live. An institution has a purpose. Institutions are permanent, which means that they do not end when one person is gone.

Jack: Big institution which is, you know, it has steps and procedures and policies. Same like that. The metropolitan police also has steps...procedures, and it's also quite disciplined as well. So, I wanted to go directly into it and I got in straight away. 

Rich: Did you not feel you had already had enough of institutions and danger…?

Jack: Yeah...if you look at everything in life, everything in life is an institution. If you look in a normal business, now that's also an institution. There is a director there who will basically expect a certain amount of discipline and policy and procedures, adhered to. 

Rich: Yeah… 

Jack: So in private, public, it's all the same. You're just there….you need to enjoy what you're doing and you’re also trying to pay the bills, to be honest. And I believe there's a natural career step. 

Rich: It makes sense...it's I mean, it’s a lot different, I think to other institutions, if you work for a bank, you're not going to be arresting people and getting shot at. 

Jack: No,  if you bogged down to the finer details in banks, for instance, there are, there is again, there's targets. You have to, you have to recruit a certain amount of new customers to join up. And there is target based. 

Rich:  Yeah… 

Jack: You have to sell certain products, such as credit cards, savings accounts, et cetera, et cetera. Likewise in the police force as well..you are target based. You have to try and reduce the crime in certain areas. You do try and enforce the law….

Rich: Hmm… 

Jack: ….help out the local community, wherever you're based. So, yeah. 

Rich:  Yeah. So just to go back there, so a target is a goal. 

Above - A visual representation of a target. 

Jack: That’s right…

Rich: It's something that they want…

Jack: That’s right… 

Rich: ...to aim to achieve, aim to accomplish in that, in that profession. So, I'm going to start with some extremes here. 

Jack: Okay.

Rich: Okay. What's the best bit about being a police officer? 

Jack: The best bit about being a police officer? I think the most important bit is you are…

Rich:  ....going through traffic with the lights on…

Jack: ...that's, right? Yeah. Well, you can only do that as if you are responding to a call. 

Rich: No...Coffee and donuts…

Jack: Coffee and donuts. That's the usual stereotype? 

Vocab: Stereotype - A stereotype is a mistaken idea or belief many people have about a thing or group that is based upon how they look on the outside, which may be untrue or only partly true. 

Rich: Sorry, go on. I did not promise you a stereotype free interview. 

Jack: Oh is that right… it’s got biased. 

Rich: Yeah, sorry. Go ahead. 

Jack: Okay. So, in the police force, well in the metropolitan police force, it's quite a secure job. It is a really, really good job. You know…

Rich: Just to explain that the metropolitan police force refers to the London one.

Jack: So, in London  there's two police forces. 

Rich: Okay, please, please explain. 

Jack: There is… there's a metropolitan police force, which is… which operates with about 30,000 officers, which covers the whole of London...which covers the whole of London. And then there is the London city police. 

Rich: Yeah… 

Jack: Well, the city of London, they operate differently where it is for the banks, which is like HSBC and all these, there was a financial capital of London as well. And the city of London police, they operate within that jurisdiction. 

Rich: Jurisdiction being area. 

Jack: Area.. 

Rich: Legal area, like…

Jack: Area…

Rich: Location. Sorry. Did you, did you get to the point — what's the best bit about being a police officer? 

Jack: Not yet.. 

Rich: Sorry…

Jack: I went off on a tangent there. The police force... the best bit is you are in a service. You’re wearing the same uniform. You are a part of society, but you are looked up to it's quite a respectable job as a police officer. 

Vocab: Tangent - a completely different line of thought or action. 

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: If I go into, I don't know, court, for instance, you know…

Rich: Yeah…

Jack: ...the judge’s refer to me as an officer as well, and, you know… you have a quiet, good inter...you have a good relationship with the judges, the solicitors and barristers, but yeah…. it's a different part of society that you know, that people don't know about.

Rich: Yes, certainly it is that you get to see things that you wouldn't have access to in another type of job. So, the other extreme, then what's the worst part about being a police officer in London? 

Jack: The worst part, as you know, in London, there was a lot of crime that happens. It's a city of nine or 10 million people. We really only have 30 thousand officers. If you, now, if you now put that into a ratio, 30,000 officers for 10 million people, it's not enough. 

Rich: There are less now as well. Right? Because they reduced the numbers. Is that correct? 

Jack: That's right. As I was… in 2014, when the previous... as you know, the new prime minister is David Cameron, but the previous prime minister, Theresa May… she was the home minister.

Rich: Boris Johnson. You mean? 

Jack: Sorry, Boris Johnson. Who did I say was prime minister?

Rich: So, yeah, just to explain there… we had, it was Theresa May… David Cameron then no... No, hang on David Cameron… Theresa May… Borris Johnson… 

Jack: ….Johnson now. 

Rich: Yeah...

Jack: So, when David Cameron was in power when he was in office as a prime minister, the home minister was Theresa May and she was in charge for….in charge of all the spending for the police… police and the public services like NHS and so on. And she was she… did a lot of cuts because there was a recession at the time as well…

Rich: Hmmm…

Jack: ...but she cuts a lot of the public spending on the public uniform forces. Hence why that's why there was a massive shortage. There was a lot of shortage for police officers…

Rich: and that's the worst thing, right? 

Jack: Yeah… It's not enough to do everything.  That's right. We cannot do everything. And also, a lot is expected of us. 

Rich: Yeah.. 

Jack: So, say for instance, I'm traveling down in uniform… I'm in uniform, I'm traveling down and then all of a sudden people will just approach you. People will just come out of the woodworks and they will come to you and say  “Look, officer, there is someone over there, he is arguing with someone else can you please go and deal with it?”. You as being in uniform... you're in uniform, you can't just say I'm sorry, but I'm going to another incident right now. Can I please come back to you? 

Above: London police officer in uniform 

Rich: I’m just finishing my coffee. 

Jack: That's right. Well, can I just come back to you?

Rich: Let me just finish this pack of cigarettes and then…

Jack: But you can't, you know, you can't say that you have to be, you know, straight away, but okay. I'll come and deal with it, but you are, what's actually happened inherently is you're dealing with that situation, but you're not actually, again...your actual tasks, which are set out to do, you cannot get that done.

Rich: Lots of distractions and..

Jack: Lots of distractions. Because even if you try and push it on to another colleague of yours, but they're busy as well, they're in the same boat as you. You can’t do that. 

Rich: Interesting idiom to be in the same boat. To be in the same boat. It means to be in the same position. 

Jack: That's right. 

Rich: Well circumstance as someone else. Okay, cool. So, I want to talk to you now a bit about London in general...types of crimes people can expect. And so on. Cause a lot of students will be either living in London or moving to London. Is London safe? Do you think it's a safe major city? 

Jack: Yes. I believe London is safe. The police do their best to keep it safe. And I think the public as well, do help.  A majority of the public do help the police as well to try and reduce crime. But in London, especially the city of Westminster. 

Rich: Mhmm.. 

Jack: Trafalgar square, so on... Kensington, Chelsea, they're our main tourist hubs. 

Rich: Yeah 

Jack: And what happens there? 

Rich:  Tourist hub means tourist center.

 Jack: Tourist centre.. That's right. And what happens there is a lot of pickpocketing. So, if you come to London, make sure you keep your belongings safe and close to you. 

Rich: Just explain what pick-pocketing is for…

Jack: Pick-pocketing is basically you're walking along, someone reaches into your pocket and just grabs a lovely phone and they just keep it for themselves and walk off. And you won't be, you won't be none the wiser until later on, you're trying to look for your phone and you don't have it, make sure your bags are closed… anything personal is, you know, in a safe location and you know where everything is because there's a lot of pickpocketing happening in London. But the other crime, if you look at the other side now is knife crime. There's a lot of nightclubs in London, but yeah. Tourists. It doesn't affect the tourists. It's mainly gang unrelated. 

Above - Pickpocketing 

Rich: Yeah. I have an auntie who lives in London. She was saying it. They don't, they don't stab … meaning attack with a knife. They don't stab random people so much. It's more just gangs and other gangs. 

Jack: Right. That's right. 

Rich: What's the gang violence about? Why do the gangs fight? 

Jack: So, gangs is all about money, money, and power. So gangs, for instance, if you're now operators outside of let's say Brixton, for instance. There's several gangs in Brixton and each gang we've got operating out of a council of state. They can only sell drugs within a certain jurisdiction or area. They have areas which they are in control of and they can sell drugs in that area. If someone else goes and sells drugs in another area, what happens is the other gang doesn't like it because they're now stepping on their turf. 

Rich: Turf means…?

Vocab: TURF (noun): short grass and earth under it; area one person or group considers their own. 

Jack:...area. 

Rich: Area, but turf is more used for like a drug area, right? So, jurisdiction is a legal term...turf is  more like a gang area, correct. 

Jack: Turf you can refer to it. Well, turf it's just a slang... I believe it doesn't have to refer to just, you know if I say, you know you're coming to my turf and then you're playing come into my area and you're playing up. It's not, it's just so slang, but in London, not just in London, but everybody's, you know, gangs, it's all about drugs and how to… drugs and money, and they need to keep hold of their power. So, one person will be arguing with another person and that...say person A stabs person B. Then person B dies,  person B's gang will get angry or irritated. What they do then is hunt for person A,  and they kill wo people and then person A’s gang gets more irritated. It’s just a cycle. A vicious, vicious cycle. And it keeps going on and on and on. And what they do in London nowadays, it's mainly... the main culprits it's not really older people. There are 13, 14 year olds, 15 year olds…

Rich: Yeah…

Jack: ...school kids, you know, and that's a scary part of it.

Rich: Yeah. That's young, I think, to be involved in crime, particularly with anything to do with, with knives. So something that else has been in the news a lot. I think we can't not talk about it at the moment is terrorism in London. Obviously that's a big concern for many tourists and people who want to move to London. Do you think the terror threat is high in London? Is it risky? 

Jack: Terrorism...It's happens. Well, it happens in other countries as well. 

Rich: Yeah…

Jack: ...but London is more of a sought after area because it is the tourist center, anything that happens in London is going to shake the world. Everyone in the world is going to find out about what happened in London, even the person in Uzbekistan or Turkmenistan. They're going to find out that someone blew up London bridge. 

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: That's what they're trying to do. They're trying to get impact, but you don't have to worry about terrorism. Because terrorism, the police force itself within the police force, they have counter terrorism units and they do the utmost to try and counteract it. Such as they basically, there are, there are bits where it does slip through, you know, you can't monitor everyone. It's just not possible…

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: But, they do it the best. And they counteract a lot of terrorist activities as well. 

Rich: What should people do if they see something suspicious, something unusual when they're in London?

Jack: If say, for instance, you see a bag that's just been left there. Get away from the bag, as soon as possible. 

Rich: Yeah…

Jack: Call the authorities, whoever is called the police. 

Rich: What's the number?

Jack: 999...triple nine. If it's an emergency. One-o-one ,if it's not an emergency, you can explain to them what it is. If it's... say instead of tube station speak to the...there'll be someone there'll be a staff member there who you can contact then straight away they will get in touch with British transport police and sort that issue out. Because don't be scared of… because if we show fear and, in coming to London, being a bit scared of coming to London. We’re actually letting the evil win.

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: We cannot let them win because that's what they want. They want to instigate more and more fear...but we should not let them win and we should… We should be strong. 

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: And that's how you stand against it. 

Rich: Okay. So I'm going to talk to you about one final topic and that's the topic...it's a bit of an uncomfortable one and that's the topic of bribes. So I'll just explain what this vocab means. So to bribe or a bribe, and that's when you give a police officer money generally, so that you don't get arrested or go to jail or have any other further consequences. In many countries, unfortunately, this is very common. What should people do when they're in the UK? Is it typical to bribe police officers or is this not a common occurrence in the UK?

Vocab: Bribery - an attempt to make someone do something for you by giving the person money, presents

Jack: In the UK, I believe as far as I know, it's not common because when I joined the police force, for instance, what they look for, they do a vetting process. A vetting process, which is complete disclosure of your background. 

Rich: Yeah… 

Jack: That means that you have to give details of your parents, what their bank accounts are, where they live, your siblings, that means your brothers or sisters, any family who are in any criminal activity, any family members, you know, anything. You… there was...there's four or five pages of application. You have to put everything in. And what they do in this vetting process is they check everything. They check your bank accounts, they check how much debt do you have? Are you susceptible to debt? Are you susceptible to bribery because in the police force you come across thousands...I’ve come across in my career… So I've come across thousands and thousands of bank notes... hundreds of thousands, you know? 

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: And it's very easy for me to just take the money and put it in my pocket and walk off.

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: It's very easy, but someone will find out eventually. 

Rich: Yeah. 

Jack: And it's just not worth that risk... in the police force you are always under scrutiny. And you.. 

Rich: Scrutiny means… 

Jack: Scrutiny means… you're always under the magnifying glass. 

Rich: You need to explain that as well. A magnifying glass is a glass to make a words louder… bigger on the page. If you don't have good eyesight. 

Jack: That's right. 

Rich: So it means that people are always watching you. Always looking closely and sort of everything you do, right.

Jack: That's right. So in, in the police force, for instance, if you now. Go into a house imagine, and there is a shoe box there with thousands of pounds of notes inside. You cannot take that money or count it without someone else being there. Okay. Someone else, another officer has to be there and to witness you taking the money and you cannot count it either. What do you do is take that money, put it into a evidence which is a bag which is for evidentiary purposes. And this then just gets closed off… sealed. And then there is a process for that bag as well, where it goes under a certain chain, you know, certain chains such as, you know, say for instance, the bag, it goes back to custody. 

Above - Evidence bag

Rich: Mhmmm..

Jack: Custody is where, you know, you keep people who have been arrested, it goes back to custody and then you seize it as evidence and this chain has a series of links. We cannot just take the money and it's put it anywhere, just dump it. 

Rich: Yeah.. 

Jack: That's not how it works. It has to have a series of chains and every chain is accounted for.

So every single person comes in contact with that money needs to sign their name and their warrant number. A warrant number, which is, which is basically your number. Every police officer has a number that's given and their warrant number, there to put next to it as well to account that they've been in contact with that money. But in the UK, as I was saying, bribery is just not possible. If you bribe a police officer in the UK, you’ll get into a

a lot of trouble. 

Rich: Yeah. So although this may be common in many of the countries. It's not common here and actually you will get in more trouble, not less trouble, even if you try to do it. So even if you offer the police officer money, that in itself is a crime.

Jack: That’s right. 

Rich: So even if they don't accept, it's a crime. So please do not do that in the UK because you'll get yourself in more trouble, not less so I think that's everything for today, Jack. So thanks again for joining me. 

Jack: Okay. Thank you. 

Rich: Take care and see you soon. 

Jack: Thanks. Bye. Bye.

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