Police Respond to Criticism

The Police respond to the telephone criticsm leveled at them during the Ashmore Park Police Liaison Committee.

Councillor Phil Bateman said today “Following the article that I posted on this site concerning West Midlands Police and their telephone system. I have had an exchange of correspondence with Chief Superintendent John Jones Commander of the Wolverhampton East Division.

The commander is less than happy with the reports and has made a spirited defence of the phone system currently in place. I am happy to copy the two responses that I have received from the Commander onto the web site so that his position can be widely read.


This is the response received on the 7th April in full

Dear Cllr Bateman,

Thank you for forwarding your recent press release. I have to say that your comments cause me some concern. I would be interested to learn more specific detail of the concerns expressed by local residents regarding difficulties with our telephone system. I think the Chief Constable would be the first to accept that there have been historical problems that demanded improvement.
However, the Force has made great progress recently in introducing new systems which is beginning to bear fruit.

For example, our performance in answering calls is constantly monitored
last year the Force set a target for 85% of all calls to be answered - a
target exceeded by 6% on the Wolverhampton East OCU last month, ie we answered 91% of all calls - an improvement of 7% on the same period last year. The Force has also increased its target for the year 2004/05 to 90% and we will be seeking to improve our performance even greater. Of course our ultimate goal would be to achieve 100% and we will work hard to get there.

The advice to dial 999 in the event of experiencing difficulties lacked the
important caveat that this number should only be used in the event of
emergency: an emergency is an incident which requires an IMMEDIATE police response e.g.

Where there is danger to life

Where there is a risk of serious injury

Where a crime is in progress or is about to happen

Where an offender is still at the scene or has just left


If the 999 system is used for non-urgent calls there is the heightened risk
that our call handlers will be less able to respond to emergency calls-
potentially placing life at risk.

Regards

John Jones
OCU Commander

Councillor Bateman said “I followed that response up with a further letter setting out my recollection of the debate at the Ashmore Park Police Liaison Committee. This has led to another exchange of correspondence and again it is printed here for residents to read.

This response is dated the 8th April;

Dear Cllr Bateman,

thank you for your response - it may be the case that these concerns relate to historical problems - before new systems were put in place. Nevertheless, we will continue to closely monitor our performance in this area. May I suggest that if residents have future problems they drop me a letter/e-mail giving details of the time and date when they experienced difficulty.

As I said previously, new systems are leading to significantly improved
performance. I am optimistic that the OCU will continue to exceed the Force 90% target during the new financial year.

Regards

John Jones
OCU Commander

Phil Bateman adds " I hope that you the reader can see, I have tried to be fair with the Police. The offending article that I wrote is on the home page I hope that you will read all these comments and make your own mind up. I am not attacking the police just fairly reporting and supporting the concerns of my constituents. Who feel very strongly that they are being disadvantaged."

pictured is Chief Superintendent John Jones.