Can new police reforms rid Merseyside Police of corruption and misconduct?
Can new police reforms rid Merseyside Police of corruption and misconduct?
Seven local officers have been sacked so far this year. Plus: tributes to the owner of legendary record shop Probe Records.
Dear readers — welcome to this week’s Post briefing, which is rich, varied, informative, fun and might help you shelter yourself from this week’s (anticipated) extreme heat.
At the weekend first-time Post writer Ophira Gottlieb delved into the magical, full-bellied world of the Liverpool Poets, whose love of language and verse is only outstripped by their other love: soup, sausages, breakfast, pastries in Kardomah cafes, fish and chips and so on. All food basically. “Another article that justifies my subscription,” wrote one commenter. Take, as a taster, this courtesy of Roger McGough: “She is as beautiful as bus tickets, / and smells of old cash / drinks Guinness off duty / eats sausage and mash.”
And coming up this week we’ve got a treasure-trove of pieces: an investigation into the Poseidon Foundation: a blockchain startup Liverpool City Council partnered with in 2018 which turned out to be — shall we say — not the wisest way to spend taxpayers’ money (if you know something about this story, please get in touch); a look at how our region might better protect itself against flash flooding, and a deep dive into the new Anfield Road stand.
🚨 A quick reminder that we are currently hiring a staff writer for The Post — please apply by Sunday 24 September or tell friends who might be interested in the role. We would love to hear from amazing journalists from across the region — including people from diverse backgrounds who might not think they have the connections or confidence to secure a role in this industry. Finding an amazing person — whether they are young or old, experienced or new to the game — is our number one priority at the moment, and we would be extremely grateful for any help you could offer us. The company we are part of, Mill Media Co, is also hiring two senior positions in Manchester — one editorial and one commercial.
Editor’s note: Thanks so much for all the incredible comments, tweets, emails and so on after our big fundraising announcement last week — the sensational news that we have received financial backing from media superstars like Sir Mark Thompson, the former director general of the BBC and ex-CEO of the New York Times, who is credited with completely turning around that media company. The outpouring of goodwill was almost overwhelming and it goes to show what an incredible community we’re building, with people who are genuinely invested in the growth of this project. That funding boost means our model for local news can be extended across the country; it has the potential to be truly transformational and push back against the present-era of tedious clickbait that is designed with the sole purpose of attracting eyeballs and little else. Closer to home? We’ll just keep doing what we’re doing, only with more scope for bigger projects and investigations. What better time to join?
Right, enough self-congratulation for now. Today’s big story looks at the alarming number of police officers sacked for misconduct in Merseyside, and how increased police powers to rid the force of corruption have been met with mixed reviews.
Elsewhere we’ve got some rather sad news for Liverpool boxing fans, a gorgeous home in Meols and sunshine — yes actual sunshine (until Sunday at least).
This week’s weather
Tuesday ☀️ Sunny and a moderate breeze with highs of 25°C
Wednesday ☀️ Sunny and a gentle breeze with highs of 25°C
Thursday 🌤️ Sunny intervals and lights winds with highs of 26°C
Friday 🌤️ Sunny intervals and gentle breeze with highs of 23°C
Weekend ⛈️ Sunny intervals and gentle breeze with highs of 24°C. Thundery showers on Sunday
This week’s weather forecast is sourced from BBC Weather and it’s for Liverpool.
Open newsroom
Staff, pupils, former staff, former pupils and whoever else with knowledge of or opinions about the Bluecoat school in Wavertree please step forward. Jack’s working on a big project looking at the school’s recent history and needs to speak to as many people as possible. If you might be able to help please email jack@livpost.co.uk.
Actors, directors, theatre fanatics: we’re writing a piece about the culture of Liverpool’s theatre scene. Email abi@livpost.co.uk to find out more.
The big story: Police are being given more power to sack corrupt officers — but is it enough to regain public trust?
Top line: The government says it will make it easier to sack rogue police officers, after a plethora of corruption scandals in recent years have eroded the public’s trust in police forces across the country. Police chiefs will be given more power to decide whether an officer should be sacked, with any findings of gross misconduct automatically resulting in dismissal.
Context: In Merseyside, there have been a number of high profile cases of corruption and inappropriate behaviour in the past year:
Chief inspector Stephen Rice was fired in February after it was discovered he had persistently contacted a property developer allegedly linked to criminal gangs. Rice had previously been responsible for policing across Toxteth and Picton, and had also served as a firearms officer.
In June, former Merseyside constable Samantha Simpson was sacked for racist WhatsApp messages. In a text to her boyfriend at the time, Simpson wrote: “I don’t go to them garages cause they’ve got weird pervy P**** in them, like never have gone in there". Another read: “Omfg they have given me the wrong boots Ben, no, the f**** P*** c****”.
Wallasey officer Stuart Descombes was sacked for stalking a fellow officer in July, and handed a 12 week prison sentence. According to court reports, he "pursued a course of conduct which amounted to the stalking of (the officer)”, and he “sent her unwanted contact in various forms of communication, attended her home address and her place of work."
Police constable Philip Jameson resigned before he could be sacked last month after 16 different allegations arose of inappropriate behaviour involving fellow female officers. On one occasion, Jameson grabbed a colleague by the hips and pulled her towards his groin during a night out.
A Freedom of Information request filed by the Echo revealed that a total of 12 Merseyside officers were sacked in 2021 as a result of gross misconduct — double the 2020 number. Seven more were sacked in 2022, and another seven so far this year.
How will the reforms work? Currently, an independent lawyer chairing the misconduct panel decides whether or not a police officer should be dismissed. The changes proposed by the government would mean that instead, police chiefs will chair the misconduct panel, with a lawyer providing legal advice rather than calling the shots.
Any findings of gross misconduct will automatically result in a police officer’s dismissal, removing the option of imposing lesser punishments like a written warning.
Sir Mark Rowley, the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, has previously complained about the limited powers of police chiefs during a misconduct hearing. It is hoped that this change will give the chiefs more authority, and allow them to decide who should — and shouldn’t — be a part of their own force.
“Public trust must be restored – this is an important step to ensure we are ridding forces of rogue officers,” policing minister Chris Philp said on the proposed changes.
“Confidence in our police forces has been rocked recently. These changes will ensure that police chiefs will have the ability to act fast to remove officers guilty of serious misconduct or who are poorly performing.”
However, not everyone remains optimistic about the new police powers. “Nothing less than an anti-corruption commission with broad and far reaching powers will be able to clean out the Augean stables,” one Twitter user wrote in response to the government’s announcement. “They will still find a way around not sacking corrupt officers! Corruption is a business,” another tweeted.
Bottom line: While the reform of police misconduct hearings demonstrates a desire to rid the force of corruption, recent events will make it difficult for the police to regain trust quite so quickly. In Merseyside alone, over a dozen officers have been sacked for their connections to crime, racism and sexual assaults in the past two years, and nationally, cases like the murder of Sarah Everard remain etched into the minds of the public.
Your Post briefing
An inquest has opened into the deaths of Elaine and Philip Marco — the elderly couple who were killed in the Mossley Hill floods last Saturday. The pair, aged 76 and 77, died after becoming trapped inside their car on Queens Drive. Emergency services were called by members of the public just before 9.30pm; however at this point the car was already submerged in water. In a short hearing, Liverpool coroner’s court heard that first aid was administered to both Elaine and Philip on the scene, but both died shortly after. “This is a complex investigation,” André Rebello, the senior coroner for Liverpool, said. “Clearly there are questions that will need to be answered with regard to the highway authority, the system of work, maintenance of the road, vigilance with regard to inclement weather.” Jack has been working on a piece unpicking the complexities of this tragedy — that comes out tomorrow.
A sad day for fans of Liverpool boxer Liam Smith, as Chris Eubank Jr defeated him in the final round of a much-anticipated boxing match in Manchester this weekend. The bitter rivals first came to blows in January this year, when Smith knocked down Eubank in just four rounds at the AO Arena. The fight brought Eubank’s career into question, with many wondering if a further defeat would mark the end of his boxing days. Instead, Eubank proved he had plenty of fight still left in him, knocking down Smith twice in this weekend’s match before a technical knockout (TKO) was called in round ten.
A doctor who raised concerns about Lucy Letby said he’s been overwhelmed by the number of emails he’s received from NHS staff in recent weeks, flagging worries about how the health system handles whistleblowing. Dr Stephen Brearey raised concerns with senior management at the Countess of Chester hospital about the link between Letby and the deaths of several babies in 2015, but was ignored. He’s since said that the emails he’s received from other staff members seem to share a “theme”: clinicians raising concerns and then "being put into mediation by senior managers''. An investigation into Letby’s time at the Liverpool Women’s Hospital has been launched to establish if any further deaths occurred while she was working there. Read our piece on that here.
Tributes have been pouring in after the death of Annie Davies — the owner of legendary Liverpool record shop Probe Records. Annie established the shop with her husband Geoff Davies back in 1971, and it soon became the epicentre of exciting new music and culture in the city. Probe Records occupied many locations in its time; hopping from Clarence Street to the basement of Silly Billies, Button Street to Slater Street, finally landing in its current home on School Lane in 2010. "Always very stylish in black and leather, she had the look of Chrissy Hynde crossed with one of those great girl garage bands of the 1960s,” wrote Marc Jones, a local club promoter. “She was like the Mum of Probe for all the staff.”
Home of the week
Botanophobes beware! The world’s greenest property (located in Meols, Wirral) is up for sale for £475,000. Wrapped tight in a cocoon of foliage, the property also boasts a pond, three bedrooms, a secluded location and of course, those beautifully landscaped gardens.
Post Picks
🎤Acclaimed alt-folk duo Nunnery Norheim head to the Liverpool Philharmonic’s Music Room this Saturday in support of their latest album, I Saw the City. Tickets are available here, with support offered by Sara Wolff.
📖Enjoy a mix of puppetry and traditional storytelling this Saturday with an enchanting performance dedicated to the life and times of renowned writer and abolitionist William Roscoe. The show, held at The Athenaeum, will see the man come magically alive and leap out of his portrait. Find out more here.
🎥On Thursday, the Liverpool Tool Library hosts a special viewing of Almost Liverpool 8 — a new film based on the images of Toxteth taken by acclaimed photojournalist Don McCullin in the early 1970s. Book a ticket here.
🎸Rock band The Skinner Brothers head to Kazimier Stockroom on Friday, with support from The Lags & The Homeless Poetry Club. Buy tickets here.
Our favourite reads
Hailing from a deep, dark corner of northern Scotland, the photographer Rob Bremner found a new home in Merseyside when he moved O Level-less to the only art school that would have him in 1983. But before long he became one of our very best documenters of street life. He’s captured images of thousands of people along the way, usually giving them just one instruction: “Stand there and don’t smile.” One of his many ambitions is a project aimed at photographing every single person in Liverpool. “I’m more interested in documenting kids today, because everything changes, the fashions and so on,” he says. “And then those photographs will become memories for them in another 30 or 40 years, after I’m dead.” Read Bremner’s “my best shot” Guardian interview.
More than 18 million Brits visited Spain in 2018, many hailing from our neck of the woods (Ibiza has its own Scouse Week, of course!), and this year is set to push the record even higher. But we aren’t particularly welcome. In places like Magaluf, essentially pockets of the UK in the Mediterranean, where “G-rated home comforts, like kebab shops, Yorkshire pudding and pubs, all at strikingly affordable prices” are available on every corner, there are ever-louder calls to stem the British “invasion”. The New York Times meets the heavy-drinking, low-spending Brits-on-tour, to see if they’re as bad as their reputation suggests.
Liverpolitan poses an argument it describes as “heretical” and certain to cause distress and offence in equal measure: that Liverpool should throw in its lot with Manchester as a large-scale dual-city combined authority in a bid to inspire collective economic growth. The piece looks back to the world’s first intercity railway, which ran between the two cities 200 years ago; a moment of genuine global significance. By umbilically connecting two “half-cities”, the “nexus for Britain’s industrial and imperial prowess for the next hundred years” was created. Were an olive branch to make its way along the M62, what might a modern version of this two-way relationship look like? Read the piece.
Letters from readers
I enjoyed reading the article almost as much as reading the poems themselves. The Liverpool poets were very influential in popular culture and a big music hero of mine, Paul Weller, cites them and used that method of using the mundane aspects of everyday life to create a song several times, particularly during his Jam days. More articles like this please, ‘'Love is fish and chips on winter nights': why were the Liverpool Poets so obsessed with food?’, Stevo
Poetry is a form of literary art. No artist can perform well on an empty stomach as food has always been the fundamental stimulant that brings out the artist in all of us. Come to think of it, poetry itself is very much like cookery which involves different ingredients and methods with varying end results and one person's haute cuisine often is someone else's acquired taste or worse, ‘'Love is fish and chips on winter nights': why were the Liverpool Poets so obsessed with food?’, Rennie Ku
I’m a former employee of Merseyside Police (18 years), during which I was also the full time Chair of the Black Police Association (a staff support network). Since leaving in 2017, I've also attended several misconduct hearings as a private citizen. Therefore, I’m familiar with the police misconduct process. The devil will be in the detail, and it remains to be seen exactly what the new misconduct system will look like, including what specific additional powers the Chief Constable will be given.
However, it is important to note that the current set up of a three-person misconduct hearing panel, replaced what is roughly being proposed now. In other words, prior to 2016 Chief Officers previously had the power and the opportunity to dismiss reprehensible officers and staff but often chose not to. Sometimes this was in the face of heinous offending. For example, during the old system I observed irrefutably proven racist colleagues keep their jobs and celebrated this afterwards. Meanwhile, the life of the victim spiralled downwards, to the point of suicide.
Chief Officers couldn’t be trusted to dismiss reprehensible officers and staff. Considering such erroneous decision making, the facility was taken off them, not least to restore public confidence. This is also the reason being touted for why the new system is now necessary!
The current three-person panel consists of a senior police officer but crucially two non-police officers/staff. The reason why record numbers are being dismissed is complex and nuanced. One factor is the weight of public pressure. It has shifted in terms of what is deemed acceptable conduct from police officers. I believe police officers being in the minority on misconduct panels, is another factor. The number of times I would hear and still hear police officers knee-jerk defend other police officers, when devoid of key basic facts or any facts, is countless. One person on a panel with potential misguided loyalty is better than three!
To reiterate, the devil will be in the detail but I’m not confident the newly proposed misconduct process will yield improved outcomes for the public. I’ve yet to witness or read of a dismissal that came close to being unjust, so I wonder what the aim of the new proposal is. I did witness one case last year when Sergeant Craig Baker should have undoubtedly been dismissed for racism. Despite a gross misconduct case being proved against him, he kept his job. A decision I described at the time as perverse and retrograde. However, when I consider the current Government and their various culture war utterances and constant obsessive references to ‘woke’, my suspicions kick in as it is they who will be introducing the changes.
In the face of damning reports such as Scarmen, Loosen the Shackles (local), McPherson, Morris, Lammy, Casey et al, Policing continues to be tinkered with. I believe a Royal Commission or other substantive root and branch review that takes the community with it, is long overdue.
Vinny Tomlinson
In other public services there is ongoing external appraisal of individuals and, in the case of teachers a gruelling ofsted inspection at regular intervals. Accountability is paramount in education and healthcare. Yet, in the case of policing, it appears that accountability towards the public is minimal. How are officers appraised on their knowledge of the law? What restraint is there to prevent profiling, harassment and bullying by ignorant, power fuelled or racist officers? Do issues of misconduct towards members of the public receive the same attention as those towards other officers? Isn't it time our police forces were subjected to same ongoing close scrutiny as others? OfPol? As the freedoms to speak, protest and gather in public are being eroded, surely we should be able to rely on a police force that abides by the law; the antics at the coronation spectacle suggest otherwise.