6 replies to this topic

[TroyTempest]

One of the topics that comes up often is what a given unit is like and what their remit is. We've had a few of late so I'm kicking off this thread. I'm loathed to ask that it be pinned, there are so many already. Anyway, thanks to a chat with one of the Marine Policing Unit guys they've agreed to let me post this, a day in the life of. I'm trying to get descriptions of other units.

A Day in the life of the Marine Policing Unit

Anyhow a day in the life of the MPU! Shift pattern is 12 hours. 7.00am to 7.00pm. 2 days, 2 nights, 4 off. Split into 4 Response Teams. You then have the Divers, the Line Access lot and the TAC team - all operate a shift and call-out pattern. We as MSC don't really get that involved with them at this stage - very specialist (divers have to do an 8 week course which is just the beginning!).

Typical things we do on shift would be to support the RNLI should someone fall or jump in the river. There is then the aftermath of all that - hospital, handover to land units, etc. I have to say that when someone is in the water it is pretty much 40 knots all the way to them - not like your average I call. You then also have to monitor three radios at the same time: Pan London South, Local Dispatch 1 and VHF - gets quite mad trying to hear what's happening especially with the noise and then the 'turbulance'! Quite often the lifeboat gets there first in which case we just support them as best as possible.

We provide a number of boats:

We tend to provide a boat upriver around Westminster, Waterloo and Vauxhall. Here we just go up and down making sure there is nothing suspicious in and around the area. We also then respond to any calls that may come out. Quite often we'll patrol the piers and the embankments providing a hi-vis presence. Then there are the marinas where we do our community bit and give reassurance.

Intercepts are good fun - here if we believe that a vessel has been involved in something we will board it and search it. Can be quite hairy seeing as both boats are moving and there is this huge expanse of the Thames in the way. A lot of boats also aren't designed to allow us to easily jump onboard!

Obviously deal with floaters in which case they are recovered, photographed and taken back to Wapping for evidencing and removal. Can be quite yucky.

Licensing visits where we board the commercial vessels and check that all is good. You do get the odd bit of grief on these and we quite often get on them to stop fights. Funniest one was when we were called to Greenwich Pier for a boat load of 700 students all kicking off. 2 locals turned up initially and then the skipper of the vessel decided he was going to kick all the students off in Greenwich to find there own way home. RG were not best pleased! All ended well though - a couple of MPU arrests came from it.

Another boat which covers the lower reaches of the Thames down to the Darford Crossing. Similar stuff there except we very often go out in the van first thing and check a few local canals and docks. This van/boat will respond to anything that is inland so for example they would have been at the Serpentine yesterday initially pulling that chap out of the water. They also attended that accident in Hounslow where a girl was killed falling off a banana boat.

[TroyTempest]

Life in the OSU

The hot potato of the MSC it would seem. To hopefully clear up a few rumours…
Firstly the OSU IS NOT THE TSG!!!

The OSU is a centrally tasked Specialist OCU (I know, I know… specialist…) tasked to deal with night-time economy crime, most serious violence and knife enabled crime.
We work a rolling shift pattern of a Friday night, weekend off, Saturday night, weekend off. The main emphasis is placed on making your own team night, though you are able to go out on other teams' nights if you are able.


The OSU has a number of resources available to them. The main one being the strong regular officer support with there being a regular Sergeant at each of the three bases (NW-Hendon, NE- Havering and SE-Eltham) and a regular PC responsible for each team (DSO- Deployment Support Officer), supported by several Special Sergeants. There are also a large fleet of designated vehicles and other things best left as a surprise public/style_emoticons/default/whistling.gif.

One debate that often seems to occur is about what the OSU really does. On joining the OSU as a new officer, you will work with experienced trained tutor constables (both regular and specials) to bring your core policing skills up to scratch, including completing the all important IPS status. This will mainly consist of deployment to trouble hotspots throughout the MPD, often in high visibility or pulse vehicle patrols. Also available to you are midweek deployments where you are able to focus on some of the areas of policing that Friday and Saturday nights with the Unit don't allow for such as domestics and shoplifters (Yes the OSU does deal with them to!)

Once you have found your feet as an officer and are more competent with the core tasks of policing (searches and arrests etc) you may well progress to some of the slightly more Gucci roles such as plain clothes operations with TSG and Dogs, Pan London response work, unarmed support for CO19 and executing warrants across London.

Finally once you are IPS and have a year or two under your belt comes the real bling!! Here you are able to express you interest in response courses, MOE and of course Level 2 public order. Here you will end up regularly working alongside TSG units around London in various capacities as well as taking part in higher risk warrantsoperations and of course Aid.

So yes, the OSU does get a lot of courses etc, but there is a lot of work involved before you get there. Don't expect to join the unit and be out on TUC marches the next week. Those officers that do have courses such as response and L2 have worked hard to get there and often been all around the MPD getting a lot of experience on the way.
We try hard to build a good reputation and yes there are times where we could do things differently, but one thing is for sure we are part of the MSC the same as anyone else and will always try to help you to.

Hope this helps

Edited by WhatAmIDoing, 02 April 2012 - 10:17 AM.
Update location of SE base.

[JS]

So, here is the one for CO15 (Traffic OCU).

A day in the life of a Traffic MSC officer

CO15 has a relatively small MSC contingent - a total of seventeen officers across four garages (bases). 1 MSC Inspector, four MSC sergeants and twelve MSC Constables. There are plans to add two more officers per garage to bring numbers up to twenty five across London. All officers are IPS and most have more than four years service - officers have to be fully capable with borough policing before joining as the specialist knowledge adds to this base because there is still a need to do many of these things when on patrol.

The main priority for the CO15 MSC team is to deal with issues raised by Safer Neighbourhood Teams - typically these are speed enforcement or anti-social driving complaints. A second priority is to deal with Traffic OCU priorities and supporting borough MSC teams with pre-planned operations. The CO15 MSC officers are all trained in speed enforcement devices (lasers), in-car ANPR/Provida (video), Hollow spike tyre deflation systems (stinger), Field Impairment Testing (drug drive), weighing of overweight vehicles, tintman (to measure window tints) and lantern (mobile finger print device). In addition approx 30% of the unit are level 3 driver (response) trained, with a further 30% due to undertake a course later in the year.

A typical shift will start with officers patroling from the garage to a tasking location as a result of a request from an SNT / resident. On the way the officers may notice an offence such as a mobile phone being used or a vehicle with a defective tyre, overweight vehicles etc. These motorists will be stopped, checks carried out and the appropriate disposal method used. It may be as a result of these checks that a driver is found to be unlicenced/insured so the car is seized.

Once at the tasking location, enforcement will be carried out. The exact type of enforcement depends on the reason for the task and to how it is done and therefore so does the end result. Officers often discover offences whilst carrying out these tasks, such as drink drivers, disqualified drivers, possession of class A, offensive weapons etc.

Whilst carrying out the assigned tasks officers may be re-deployed to calls, these include collisions, requests from borough officers to do FIT tests, incidents on fast roads etc etc. Often the regular officers get tied up with other things, so the MSC officers can be the only fast road trained unit available, so the provision of response courses has ensured that officers can attend these calls in a timely fashion. If officers are close to borough calls (fights etc), the team will also attend these calls.

Oficers then return to the garage to complete paperwork, this usually takes an hour or so as even without any arrests there will be a considerable amount of evidence to write up.

James

Edited by JS, 18 April 2011 - 09:44 PM.

[fence]

In this topic shall be all the information you need or want to find out about your borough.

• KG - Barking & Dagenham (Pending)
  
• SX - Barnet
  
• RY - Bexley
  
• QK - Brent (Pending)
  
• PY - Bromley
  
• EK - Camden (16/8/12 - page missing)
  
• ZD - Croydon (Need more info)
  
• XB - Ealing
  
• YE - Enfield
  
• RG - Greenwich (Need more info)
  
• GD - Hackney (Need more info)
  
• FH - Hammersmith & Fulham (Need more info)
  
• YR - Haringey
  
• QA - Harrow (Pending)
  
• KD - Havering (Pending)
  
• XH - Hillingdon (Need more info)
  
• TX - Hounslow (16/8/12 - page missing)
  
• NI - Islington (16/8/12 - page missing)
  
• BS - Kensington & Chelsea (16/8/12 - page missing)
  
• VK - Kingston-Upon-Thames (Pending)
  
• LX - Lambeth (16/8/12 - page missing)
  
• PL - Lewisham !! Link updated !!
  
• VW - Merton (Pending)
  
• KF - Newham !! Content updated !!
  
• JI - Redbridge
  
• TW - Richmond Upon Thames (Pending)
  
• MD - Southwark (Pending)
  
• ZT - Sutton
  
• HT - Tower Hamlets
  
• JC - Waltham Forest
  
• WW - Wandsworth (16/8/12 - page missing)
  
• CW - Westminster(More info on Westminster)
  
• OSU Operational Support Unit(More info on the OSU) (Even more info on OSU)
  
• CO15 (Traffic) / MSU(Marine Support Unit / STC (Safer Transport Command)

Topics that are marked "Pending" need information about the borough, so if you wish to create/update a topic about that borough with information about the borough I will then edit the link. Topics that need more info basically need more info about the borough and what you do as a special on the borough and how its setup.

If you've updated anything just hit me up with a PM incase I miss it

PS: WAID after a borough has been updated with all the information do you want to close the topic to stop it from getting bumped numerous times?

Edited by MXL160, 12 December 2012 - 05:41 PM.

[MXL160]

A day in the life of an STC OSG Officer

Based partly on the model of the TP Operational Support Unit (OSU), the STC Operational Support Group (OSG) also reflects the roles of traditional STC Task Teams staffed by regular officers.

The OSG is part of the STC HQ group of units and has officers who transfered from other OCUs as well as those recruited directely from training school.

The teams operate out of two bases, one at Palestra (a modern TfL building, opposite Southwark tube station) and the other at King’s Cross Police Station. Both are supported by experienced regular PCs - Deployment Support Officers (DSO) – alongside the normal MSC supervisory structure. There is an acting S/Insp plus four S/Sgts who are the first level of line management for SCs and they report directly to the team’s regular PS.

The majority of patrols for the OSG are when the transport system is at its busiest or users are most vulnerable, so particularly on Friday and Saturday nights. Taskings are in response to the appropriate Tactical Assessment and use a range of tactics to support the relevant STC objectives – this could include plain clothes roles, vehicle or cycle support amongst others.

Because of the concentration of transport hubs, routes and crime in the Westminster area, the team has hisorically worked there in the main although they have always (and particularly more so recently) also been tasked to tackle hot spots anywhere pan-London.

A typical weekend night shift would involve parading at 2000/2200hrs and being briefed on the evening’s tasking. For example this has previously involved plain clothes work looking to be touted and dealing with the offenders (see this press release - http://www.met.polic..._operation.html) as well as shifts operating in teams on problem bus routes either in plain clothes or uniform, spotting and dealing with various offences from criminal damage and anti social behaviour to assaults and drug dealing.

OSG officers also work closely with the TfL Revenue Protection Inspectors (RPIs) and have been commended for their enthusiasm and knowledge as well as their hands on and supportive nature. The OSG was the lead unit in supporting some of the RPIs introducing their new CSAS powers earlier in the year.

We also provide serials of MSC officers to both STC and CO11 Aid and it is a requirement of being on the team that at least three Aid or large events are undertaken every year. The OSG also works alongside other STC HQ units including Cycle Task Force, Cabs Sex Offenders Unit and the Roads Response Team (RRT) which itself also has a strong and effective MSC presence.

There are currently a number of trained mentors on the teams who provide support to officers working towards their IPS / SOROC. The flexibility of the DSOs and S/Sgts means that regular opportunities are offered midweek to undertake mentoring and support shifts. An enviable level of effort and support is provided to give officers up-front knowledge and experience of both general policing and in the areas that the OSG primarily focuses on to help them feel more comfortable before participating in the weekend taskings.

Once IPS has been achieved, the unit has the ability to offer further training opportunities to committed officers. This includes driving courses, ANPR training, FIT training, plain clothes / dippers / situational awareness sessions and cycle training.

The range of experiences in terms of deployments and training offered is fairly unique and is recognition that the contribution the OSG is making to tackling transport related crime is widely acknowledged in all areas.

The unit is self-sufficient, with a number of response and PSU drivers (both regulars and MSC) and has access to a fleet of carriers, minibuses, IRVs, Q-cars and ANPR vans. Both buildings have good facilities, with officers having their own single lockers and ready access to a pool radio, covert harnesses and other specialist equipment.

Being on the OSG allows officers a good amount of freedom and individual responsibility whilst in a supportive environment where personal development is encouraged and rewarded. Officers have expressed how much they enjoy their posting to the OSG and are recognised performing well with a good team ethos.

Edited by MXL160, 21 February 2012 - 10:17 AM.
Edited to reflect OSG restructure after CW attachements ended

[Giraffe]

As requested by members, please find above Fence's post with links to the separate existing borough threads. Discussion of borough choices more generally can be found here.

If any of this needs updating, please contact one of the Met mini-mods (SBG, TroyTempest, or MXL160) in the first instance.

Edited by MXL160, 12 December 2012 - 05:42 PM.
Changed to Troy

[MXL160]

I know a few people have said they'd be willing to provide updates, so thought I'd put the call out more formally!

- if the borough already exists in the list of links above, please just update that thread
- if the link is broken, please search to see if another thread already exists and if not create a new one which we'll then link to instead
- if your borough doesn't already have a thread, create a new one telling people what the MSC does and has available to it and we'll add it to the links above

If you're joining a borough and the link doesn't work or exist, then add a message to this thread asking someone to provide an update.

As at 11th December, the current list of requests for information is:

Brent
Camden
Harrow
Hounslow
Lewisham

Edited by MXL160, 12 December 2012 - 05:41 PM.