"Up for grabs…" – privatising the police

Fair enough, but that doesn’t mean that theoretically privatization is wrong, does it? It means that the currently accepted way is wrong, but in the right hands it could work.

Well, theoreticaly, communism, fascism and anarchism work perfectly as well. Sadly, human nature gets in the way.
Free marketeers are as dogmatic, deluded and unwilling admit doubt as any religious fundamentalist, but potentially far more dangerous.

Free marketeers are as dogmatic, deluded and unwilling admit doubt as any religious fundamentalist, but potentially more dangerous.

And almost as blind as those that aren’t even prepared to contemplate an alternative option.
Dogmatic is something I’m not often (read: ever) accused of being, but if it help your argument sit in your mind more easily, go for it. 🙂
Is there anything more dogmatic than “public sector is the only way and anything else is rubbish”?

Have these good police people who are being pushed to the limits ever considered doing unpaid overtime? Of course not…

Davidjones – did you seriously suggest the police should be doing unpaid overtime ie working for free?

Do you actually have any understanding of how the police force works? A coper goes of shift when their work is finished not at a particular time ie compulsory overtime.

If a big fight breaks out in the town centre 15 mins before their shift is due to finish they will be sent to it, they will not be able to go off duty until all detainees are processed etc – that could be a couple of hours later.

You wan them to do that for free?

Privatisation – is always more expensive for a worse service – this is not refusing to contemplate an alternative – this is the knowledge from experience

I’m willing to explore alternatives – but when that alternative has been proven to be wrong on every single occaision when it has been implemented, I’d be pretty stupid to advocate it’s introduction again, wouldn’t I?

‘But we’ll get it right this time’.

Yes. Of course you will.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Albert Einstein.

Don’t always agree with TJ but in this case I very much do.

Never mind the public sector even in the private sector where once stuff was done in house it was farmed out because it was “cheaper” well for the first year the headline costs were lower but then the wheels started to fall off.
Our firm farmed out security & cleaning and now we spend more & spend longer managing the useless firms doing it, we have a high turnover of staff in these two lines where previously we had people staying for 20 years+ all this means a poorer service.

Interesting to see the different perspectives here and I’m not particularly interested in sides, but one post sums up the basic difference (to me at least) between large parts of the public and private sector.

TandemJeremy – Member
Have these good police people who are being pushed to the limits ever considered doing unpaid overtime? Of course not…
Davidjones – did you seriously suggest the police should be doing unpaid overtime ie working for free?

Do you actually have any understanding of how the police force works? A coper goes of shift when their work is finished not at a particular time ie compulsory overtime.

If a big fight breaks out in the town centre 15 mins before their shift is due to finish they will be sent to it, they will not be able to go off duty until all detainees are processed etc – that could be a couple of hours later.

You wan them to do that for free?

In my experience, this question would not even need to be asked in large parts of the private sector. If there is an important part of your job that needs doing that requires a bit longer on the end of the day/work at the weekend…..you simply do it and, in my case, would want to do it. Pride in your work and your occupation – I would not expect extra pay either (edit – not suggesting that the alternative view negates pride in your work BTW!!). Perhaps this is why I find it hard to understand many of the different alternative perspectives on here!

WTF is a shift (rhetorical question BTW)? Work is finished when its finished not when the clock ticks past 5 or whenever. I have never worked the set hours in my contract at any stage in my career.

More fool you.

working for free is allowing your employer to to get away with underpaying and is abusive.

You are right team hurtmore – you do have no understanding of many things outside your worldview.

In my experience, this question would not even need to be asked in large parts of the private sector. If there is an important part of your job that needs doing that requires a bit longer on the end of the day/work at the weekend…..you simply do it and, in my case, would want to do it.

‘In my experience’ – I suspect you work in a rather well paid sector of private industry that employs a very small part of the working population (care to tell us where/what?).

Do you think that the people who work in the shops you use, clean the office you work in, serve food in the canteen, work on the farms that provide you with your food, drive the trucks etc etc happily work overtime for nothing?

your views normally deserve some respect, but on this occasion you reveal how isolated you are from much of the population.

teamhurtmore – Member

Interesting to see the different perspectives here and I’m not particularly interested in sides, but one post sums up the basic difference (to me at least) between large parts of the public and private sector.

TandemJeremy – Member
Have these good police people who are being pushed to the limits ever considered doing unpaid overtime? Of course not…
Davidjones – did you seriously suggest the police should be doing unpaid overtime ie working for free?

Do you actually have any understanding of how the police force works? A coper goes of shift when their work is finished not at a particular time ie compulsory overtime.

If a big fight breaks out in the town centre 15 mins before their shift is due to finish they will be sent to it, they will not be able to go off duty until all detainees are processed etc – that could be a couple of hours later.

You wan them to do that for free?

In my experience, this question would not even need to be asked in large parts of the private sector. If there is an important part of your job that needs doing that requires a bit longer on the end of the day/work at the weekend…..you simply do it and, in my case, would want to do it. Pride in your work and your occupation – I would not expect extra pay either (edit – not suggesting that the alternative view negates pride in your work BTW!!). Perhaps this is why I find it hard to understand many of the different alternative perspectives on here!

WTF is a shift (rhetorical question BTW)? Work is finished when its finished not when the clock ticks past 5 or whenever. I have never worked the set hours in my contract at any stage in my career.

Now I am confused.

When I go to Tesco and they’re closing no-one volunteers to stay an extra hour so I can wander round and do my shopping at leisure.

When I call BT cos my internet/phone are down none of their staff come out in their own time to fix it.

When the LBS hasn’t sorted my bike by 5, they don’t seem to be all that keen onstaying for another 2 or 3 hours to fix it so I can ride the following day.

When I use a myriad of other services/shops they all seem to want to close when they are done, not when I want them.

I was sure most of them were in the private sector.

I’m not sure if your being serious or trying to get a rise out of TJ but although I frequently put more hours in than I’m contracted for I don’t expect everyone else to.
I consider myself fairly paid for the job I do and am allowed a good degree of flexibility over work hours so in return I put myself out occasionally.
The people I was talking about are at minimum wage level have no say in their work patterns & generally get treated like dirt, I see little incentive for them to go the extra.

Davidjones – did you seriously suggest the police should be doing unpaid overtime ie working for free?

Hmmm! Looks like I have to spell it out, but if I look at what I wrote I think the answer is quite clearly yes. Was I not clear enough for you? 🙂

In my experience, this question would not even need to be asked in large parts of the private sector. If there is an important part of your job that needs doing that requires a bit longer on the end of the day/work at the weekend…..you simply do it and, in my case, would want to do it. Pride in your work and your occupation – I would not expect extra pay either (edit – not suggesting that the alternative view negates pride in your work BTW!!). Perhaps this is why I find it hard to understand many of the different alternative perspectives on here!

WTF is a shift (rhetorical question BTW)? Work is finished when its finished not when the clock ticks past 5 or whenever. I have never worked the set hours in my contract at any stage in my career.
100% agree.

TandemJeremy – Member

More fool you.

working for free is allowing your employer to to get away with underpaying and is abusive.

You are right team hurtmore – you do have no understanding of many things outside your worldview.
What sort of an answer is that? Hardly the material for adult debating, is it?

TandemJeremy – Member

You are right team hurtmore – you do have no understanding of many things outside your worldview. your experience True, as it is for all of us.

‘In my experience’ – I suspect you work in a rather well paid sector of private industry that employs a very small part of the working population (care to tell us where/what?).

Currently private sector – yes, but employs lot of people.

Do you think that the people who work in the shops you use, clean the office you work in, serve food in the canteen, work on the farms that provide you with your food, drive the trucks etc etc happily work overtime for nothing?

Well, yes in the really good ones, there are plenty of people who do EXACTLY that. And that explains why they are often very successful. As I said, I think a lot of really successful people focus on the job at hand and doing it to the best of their ability and better than their competitors – rather than looking at the clock. But of course, I am talking about the lucky majority who do their jobs because they want to not because they have to – and there are plenty of relatively low paid people in that category.

your views normally deserve some respect, but on this occasion you reveal how isolated you are from much of the population.

Thanks, and true. Fully admit. But to succeed in life it is often important to be different/isolated. Success is often a result of doing the things that others are not prepared to do and to be isolated.Wasn’t it Seb Coe who used to train on Xmas day for that very reason?

But first post came out a little wrong as views are not exclusive to public versus private sector more the difference between world class and average/poor providers of goods and services.

More fool you. Working for free is allowing your employer to to get away with underpaying and is abusive.

Goes into the same category as the above. Must be very sad to work in an environment where this is the prevailing culture and even sadder if that is one’s personal philosophy IMHO

Never mind the public sector even in the private sector where once stuff was done in house it was farmed out because it was “cheaper” well for the first year the headline costs were lower but then the wheels started to fall off.

I can’t speak for everyone, but has the call centre industry discovered that cheaper Asian call centres are, in fact, not better and have started to bring them back to the UK as their companies were losing customers? Cheaper is not always better. Cheaper is not the same as more efficient.
Public sector with more effective management could be more efficient.
Public sector being sold off could be more efficient and cost effective.
Equally if we discover that there are folks who are selfish and not team players, I think there will always be problems.

But first post came out a little wrong as views are not exclusive to public versus private sector more the difference between world class and average/poor providers of goods and services.

Indeed it is true

people working excessive hours / unpaid overtime give poor service and poor results. Productivity falls rapidly as hours increase as does service standards.

Again you are extrapolating from your very narrow experience and worldview.

*walks in to see what’s happening.*

TandemJeremy – Member

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Albert Einstein.

Posted 3 hours ago # Report-Post

Business as usual on the hypocrisy stakes.
*walks out again, shaking head.*

Again you are extrapolating from your very narrow experience and worldview

*Joins Don Simon and saunters away for a beer*

Indeed teamhurtmore – its very sad that you do not understand this.

Why should anyone work for free? An organisation that can only deliver if its staff work for free is not a well run business.

Again you show your complete lack of insight into the real world.

TJ – you know nothing about the breadth of my experience or worldview, but feel free to make you usual conclusions about that. You know it makes me giggle and its miserable looking out of the window at the rain/snow/sleet right now.

Still got a bit of work to do before KO and need to supervise son who is doing the same with his school work 😉

I’ve pretty much started working my contracted hours now I’m on the redundancy list

before that it was pretty much whatever it took to get the job done – some days 13 hrs, other days 3hrs
they were happy that we knocked off when finished rather than when the clock said so

the current bunch of Porche driving tossers can’t get their head around the take bit of ‘give and take’

teamhurtmore – your narrow insular and one sided worldview is very obvious and its reasonable to assume that this is because of your limited world experience.

What is really funny is you are unable to appreciate this – your view on working unpaid overtime is comical in its naivety and your patronising attitude to those who actually want fair and reasonable working conditions displays such arrogance.

I amnot the only one to see this on here.

come on – why should police work unpaid overtime?

Wasn’t it Seb Coe who used to train on Xmas day for that very reason?

For Gawd’s sake, THM, what bearing does this have on the increasingly daft privatisation of services in this country?

I’m getting rather bored of market platitudes – they bear no relation to what is actually happening on the ground. Anecdotes about Seb Coe training on Christmas Day & other such gotta-be-in-it-to-win-it whimsy is hardly sound reasoning for handing everything over to G4S, Serco and Crapita.

TJ – pls keep the personal insults coming, as I said it, makes me giggle.

noteeth – correct it is a tangent (albeit of some relevance). And not advocating your last sentance BTW

so once again teamhurtmore – you have no answer when challenged on the freemarket platitudes you trot out.

Why should the police work unpaid overtime?

albeit of some relevance

Oh yeah? Tell easygirl how it’s relevant.

And not advocating your last sentance BTW

Despite the fact that this is what is happening, right now – even as y’all trot out the same tired cliches about competition. I’m not interested in received-position PPE bullsh1Te – it tends to fall rather flat in the real world.

TJ – wow that was almost polite.

come on – why should police work unpaid overtime?

Of course TJ, you’re absolutely right. Why should anyone do overtime? The answer is very simple, to promote efficiency and improvements. If there is no competition people will stagnate and become lazy, if people can not lose their job, they will become complacent.
Competition is good, a move to a more competitive environment is not selling out to the cheapest bidder.
Have a read of this TJ and see what happens when the employees have to decide between maintaining the status quo (your stance) or making changes.
http://www.experiglot.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/09/semco.pdf

UNPAID!

the police already do compulsory overtime

How can there be competition in the police force in this way?

its utter nonsense

Why should the police do UNPAID overtime?

The answer is very simple, to promote efficiency and improvements. If there is no competition people will stagnate and become lazy, if people can not lose their job, they will become complacent.

l can honestly say that I’ve been most productive when I felt the most secure
we currently have a load of redundancies coming up, production and morale is rock bottom. The threat of losing your job has not had the affect you claim

Competition is good

If you are going to big-up the role of competition in service provision, then it is beholden upon you to also acknowledge the importance of co-operation – it’s how things get done at the sharp end of acute care, for a start. Failure to grasp this is partly why the ConDems NHS Bill is an almighty screw-up.

TJ asks question.
Question is answered.
TJ doesn’t like answer.
TJ says “its utter nonsense “
TJ expects to be taken seriously.
Keep on doing what you’re doing TJ, you’re a shining example of everything that’s wrong in this country.

l can honestly say that I’ve been most productive when I felt the most secure
we currently have a load of redundancies coming up, production and morale is rock bottom. The threat of losing your job has not had the affect you claim

Sorry to hear that, redundancy is nevver pleasant. I have experienced it once. I would say though that it’s possible that your insecurity is due to the way the management are dealing with it rather than the process itself. Hope you’re ok.

my insecurity is fact rather than perceived as I’m going, the others though are in a competition to see which 1 in 3 are staying
they’re not particularly motivated or efficient right now

Keep on doing what you’re doing TJ, you’re a shining example of everything that’s wrong in this country.

Everything that’s wrong in this country ? **** me that fella’s got a lot to answer for.

Yes TJ we’re talking about you. I know you like to blame the bankers for the mess we’re in, but it’s your sort what’s given us ‘Broken Britain’.

You should be ashamed of yourself.

you’re a shining example

Must have missed that bit, but then again don’t most comedians call it artistic license, or something?
Thanks for your contribution anyway. 😉

Must have missed that bit….

You type stuff without noticing ?

Sorry – where did yo answer the question which is:-
Why should the police do unpaid overtime?

sorry Ernie *tugs forelock*

Keep on doing what you’re doing TJ, you’re a shining example of everything that’s wrong in this country.

That would be decades spent in public service looking after the old, frail and vulnerable.

Sorry – where did yo answer the question which is:-

Have you really just asked that? Seriously? The bit about competition just flew right by you, did it? I know it’s not the answer you want, but it is an answer all the same.

That would be decades spent in public service looking after the old, frail and vulnerable, inefficiently and only for my own personal profit.

Fixed. 😉