A205 road
Brownhill Road in Catford
Major junctions
From:	Woolwich
	Woolwich Ferry A2204 road A206 road A207 road A208 road A2 road A210 road A20 road A2212 road A21 road A212 road A2216 road A2199 road A215 road A204 road A23 road A24 road A3 road A219 road A306 road A305 road A3003 road A316 road A307 road A315 road A4 road A3000 road M4 motorway A406 road
To:	Chiswick
Road network
Roads in the United Kingdom Motorways • A and B road zones

The A205 or South Circular Road is a direct route which crosses South London, UK, running from Woolwich in the east to the junction of the A406 (North Circular Road), the M4 and the A4 at Gunnersbury in the west.

Together with the North Circular Road, the South Circular forms a ring road through the inner part of Outer London. This ring road does not make a complete circuit of the city, as the crossing of the River Thames in the east is made on the Woolwich Ferry.

Unlike the North Circular, the South Circular is not a purpose-built route, but a collection of pre-existing suburban roads joined together, which has resulted in a disjointed feel, with totsos at several junctions. This makes it seem little more than a sequence of road signs.

History[link]

The South Circular Road was first proposed in Sir Patrick Abercrombie's County of London Plan of 1943, as the southern half of one of a number of ring roads around the capital. Abercrombie designated it as the "C Ring" (the third ring out from the city centre); however, the plan for a high-quality road was not realised and the semi-circular route was assigned to existing roads through the southern suburbs;^[1] these roads retain their historic names.

Ringway 2[link]

In the 1960s, Abercrombie's plans were revived by the Greater London Council (GLC) as the London Ringways Plan which proposed the construction of a series of motorways in and around London to control traffic congestion. The existing A205 route was recognised as being unsuitable for upgrading and a new motorway, Ringway 2, was planned for construction further south. Due to the destruction required and cost involved in the proposed plans the majority of the Ringway Plans were cancelled in the early 1970s including Ringway 2. The route remains mainly single carriageway and the chances of any upgrades to the road are considered small at best.

Bus lanes[link]

The majority of the South Circular Road is single carriageway, one lane each way, aside from a small section of dual carriageway near the Woolwich ferry. Some of the wider sections of the road as it travels through Brixton and Clapham, which formerly were single carriageway, albeit with two lanes each way, have had the outside lanes turned into bus lanes. This has an adverse effect on the traffic flow, and has increased congestion and journey times in many areas.^{[citation needed]} However it is the policy of Transport for London (TFL) to encourage the use of public transport, and reduce car journeys within the capital.

Route[link]

The route of the South Circular in Greater London, with the North Circular and Woolwich Ferry shown.

The route starts just south of the Woolwich Ferry where the A2204 Ferry Approach road and the A206 meet.^[2]

The route goes south, climbing up John Wilson Street, a section of dual carriageway, until it meets Grand Depot Road when it becomes a single carriageway and travels south west along Woolwich Common and Academy Road past the former Royal Military Academy. After crossing over the A207/Shooters Hill Road, the route goes along Well Hall Road until the roundabout junction with Rochester Way, when it turns slightly more west onto Westhorne Avenue and becomes dual carriageway again. It passes under the A2 at a grade separation junction, one of only two on the route, and continues south westerly as a dual carriageway, crossing Eltham Road (A210 road) and Sidcup Road (A20 road), until the junction with Burnt Ash Hill when it becomes single carriageway again - which it will remain for most of the route.

The first section of the single carriageway is Saint Mildreds Road; then, shortly after passing under the railway line, it is Brownhill Road due west all the way to the Catford gyratory system which crosses the A21 to follow Catford Road past the now closed Catford Stadium,^[3] and then Stanstead Road, where it does a totso along Sunderland Road, Waldram Park Road, Waldram Crescent and Dartmouth Road, before turning slightly north at the start of the A2216 road at Forest Hill to follow London Road past the Horniman Museum. At the junction with Wood Vale the route turns north west along Lordship Lane before it does a "totso" (turn off to stay on) west onto Dulwich Common, passing Dulwich College. The route then goes along Thurlow Park Road, crossing the River Effra, before coming to the Tulse Hill gyratory, which is a junction with the A215 and A204 roads, as well as the point where the postcode changes from SE to SW.

The route climbs slightly on Christchurch Road, crossing the A23 on Brixton Hill to become dual carriageway for the two hundred yards of Streatham Place, before returning to single carriageway on Atkins Road where there's a totso onto Poynders Road. At the junction with Cavendish Road the route turns north before curving to the north-west to arrive at the southern corner of Clapham Common where the A24 is crossed for the route to travel along The Avenue on the west side of the common.

The A205 now meets and merges with the A3 London to Portsmouth road for two miles, travelling along Battersea Rise, North Side Wandsworth Common (the second grade separation junction, over Trinity Road), Huguenot Place, East Hill, Wandsworth High Street (passing the old Ram Brewery), and West Hill where the routes diverge; the A205 going north-west along Upper Richmond Road to Kew Bridge and the junction with the M4 and the A406 North Circular Road.

See also[link]

• A roads in Zone 2 of the Great Britain numbering scheme

References[link]

v t e A roads in Zone 2 of the Great Britain road numbering scheme A2 A20 A21 A22 A23 A24 A25 A26 A27 A28 A29 A200 A201 A202 A203 A205 A206 A209 A210 A212 A213 A214 A215 A217 A219 A222 A225 A226 A227 A228 A229 A230 A232 A234 A235 A236 A237 A240 A249 A250 A253 A254 A256 A258 A259 A264 A271 A272 A274 A278 A281 A282 A299 A2022 A2030 A2100 A2199 A2204 A2212 A2216 A2217 List of A roads in Zone 2 List of B roads in Zone 2

Coordinates: 51°26′26″N 0°06′35″W / 51.4405°N 0.1098°W / 51.4405; -0.1098

The Right Honourable Ernest Bevin
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs
In office 27 July 1945 – 9 March 1951
Prime Minister	Clement Attlee
Preceded by	Anthony Eden
Succeeded by	Herbert Morrison
Minister of Labour and National Service
In office 13 May 1940 – 23 May 1945
Prime Minister	Winston Churchill
Preceded by	Ernest Brown
Succeeded by	Rab Butler
General Secretary of the Transport and General Workers Union
In office 1 January 1922 – 27 July 1945
Preceded by	Office Created
Succeeded by	Arthur Deakin
Personal details
Born	9 March 1881 Winsford, England
Died	14 April 1951(1951-04-14) (aged 70) London, England
Nationality	British
Political party	Labour
Religion	Baptist

Ernest Bevin (9 March 1881 – 14 April 1951) was a British trade union leader and Labour politician. He co-founded and served as general secretary of the powerful Transport and General Workers' Union from 1922 to 1940, as Minister of Labour in the war-time coalition government, and as Foreign Secretary in the post-war Labour Government he supported the creation of NATO.

Early life[link]

Bevin was born in the village of Winsford in Somerset, England, to Diana Bevin who, since 1877, had described herself as a widow. His father is unknown. After his mother's death in 1889, the young Bevin lived with his half-sister's family, moving to Morchard Bishop in Devon. He had little formal education, having briefly attended two village schools and then Hayward's School, Crediton, starting in 1890 and leaving in 1892.^[1] He later recalled being asked as a child to read the newspaper aloud for the benefit of adults in his family who were illiterate. At the age of eleven, he went to work as a labourer, then as a lorry driver in Bristol, where he joined the Bristol Socialist Society. In 1910 he became secretary of the Bristol branch of the Dockers' Union, and in 1914 he became a national organiser for the union.

Bevin was a physically huge man, strong and by the time of his political prominence very heavy. He spoke with a strong West Country accent, so much so that on one occasion listeners at Cabinet had difficulty in deciding whether he was talking about "Hugh and Nye (Gaitskell and Bevan)" or "you and I". He had developed his oratorical skills from his time as a Baptist laypreacher, which he had given up as a profession to become a full-time labour activist.

Bevin was married and had a daughter.

Transport and General Workers Union[link]

In 1922 Bevin was one of the founding leaders of the Transport and General Workers Union (TGWU), which soon became Britain's largest trade union. Upon his election as the union's general secretary, he became one of country's leading labour leaders, and their strongest advocate within the Labour Party. Politically, he was on the right-wing of the Labour Party, strongly opposed to communism and direct action - allegedly partly due to anti-Semitic paranoia and seeing communism as a 'Jewish plot' against Britain.^[2] He took part in the British General Strike in 1926, but without enthusiasm.

Bevin had no great faith in parliamentary politics, but had nevertheless been a member of the Labour Party from the time of its formation. He had poor relations with the first Labour Prime Minister, Ramsay MacDonald, and was not surprised when MacDonald formed a National Government with the Conservatives during the economic crisis of 1931, for which MacDonald was expelled from the Labour Party. Bevin was a pragmatic trade unionist who believed in getting material benefits for his members through direct negotiations, with strike action to be used as a last resort. During the late Thirties, for instance, Bevin helped to instigate a successful campaign by the TUC to extend paid holidays to a wider proportion of the workforce.^[3] This culminated in the Holidays with Pay Act of 1938, which extended entitlement to paid holidays to about 11 million workers by June 1939.^[4]

Foreign policy interests[link]

During the 1930s, with the Labour Party split and weakened, Bevin co-operated with the Conservative-dominated government on practical issues. But during this period he became increasingly involved in foreign policy. He was a firm opponent of fascism and of British appeasement of the fascist powers. In 1935, arguing that Italy should be punished by sanctions for her recent invasion of Abyssinia, he made a blistering attack on the pacifists in the Labour Party, accusing the Labour leader George Lansbury at the Party Conference of "hawking his conscience around" asking to be told what to do with it.

Lansbury resigned and was replaced as leader by his deputy Clement Attlee, who along with Lansbury and Stafford Cripps had been one of only three Labour Cabinet Ministers to be re-elected at the General Election in 1931. After the November 1935 General Election Herbert Morrison, newly returned to Parliament, challenged Attlee for the leadership but was defeated. In later years Bevin gave Attlee (whom he privately referred to as "little Clem") staunch support, especially in 1947 when Herbert Morrison and Stafford Cripps led further intrigue against Attlee.

Wartime Minister of Labour[link]

In 1940 Winston Churchill formed an all-party coalition government to defend the country in the crisis of World War II. As part of this he appointed Bevin to the position of Minister for Labour and National Service, although Bevin was not actually an MP at the time. To clear up this constitutional anomaly a parliamentary position was hurriedly found for him and Bevin was elected unopposed to the House of Commons as Member of Parliament (MP) for the London constituency of Wandsworth Central.

The Emergency Powers (Defence) Act gave Bevin complete control over the labour force and the allocation of manpower, and he was determined to use this unprecedented authority not just to help win the war but also to strengthen the bargaining position of trade unions in the postwar future. Bevin once quipped: "They say Gladstone was at the Treasury from 1860 until 1930. I'm going to be at the Ministry of Labour from 1940 until 1990." Given that the industrial settlement he introduced remained largely unaltered by successive postwar administrations until the reforms of Margaret Thatcher's government in the mid-1980s, this was a prescient remark.

During the war Bevin was responsible for diverting nearly 48,000 military conscripts to work in the coal industry (these workers became known as the Bevin Boys) while using his position to secure significant improvements in wages and working conditions for working-class people.^[5] He also drew up the demobilisation scheme that ultimately returned millions of military personnel and civilian war workers back into the peacetime economy. Bevin remained Minister of Labour until 1945 when Labour left the Coalition government. On V-E Day he stood next to Churchill looking down on the crowd on Whitehall.

Foreign Secretary[link]

Ernest Bevin (left) with Clement Attlee in 1945

Potsdam Conference: Clement Attlee, Ernest Bevin, Vyacheslav Molotov, Joseph Stalin, William Daniel Leahy, James F. Byrnes and Harry S. Truman.

Sitting (from left): Clement Attlee, Harry S. Truman, Joseph Stalin; behind: William Daniel Leahy, Ernest Bevin, James F. Byrnes and Vyacheslav Molotov.

After the 1945 general election, Attlee had it in mind to appoint Bevin as Chancellor and Hugh Dalton as Foreign Secretary, but ultimately changed his mind and swapped them round. Some claim that he was persuaded by King George VI to do so; but others note that whoever was Chancellor would have to work with Herbert Morrison, with whom Bevin did not get on. Indeed, it was once noted that Bevin, on overhearing a (supposed) private conversation in which somebody commented "the trouble with Herbert [Morrison] is that he is his own worst enemy", immediately responded with a booming "Not while I'm alive he ain't!" (Some sources say this was about Nye Bevan, whom he also disliked)

One anecdote from the period after Labour's 1945 landslide election victory was that, late on a Friday afternoon, he was left a number of red ministerial boxes, with a note inviting him to take the boxes home to read over the weekend if he so desired. On the following Monday morning the civil servants found the boxes as they had left them on the previous Friday with the note amended with the words "a kind thought, but sadly erroneous".^[6] At that time most diplomats were recruited from public schools, and it was said of Bevin - as a compliment to the respect which he had earned - that it was hard to imagine him filling any other job in the Foreign Office except perhaps that of an old and truculent lift attendant.

Bevin became Foreign Secretary at a time when Britain was almost bankrupt as a result of the war and yet was still maintaining a huge air force and conscript army, in an attempt to remain a global power. The effort of paying for all this - and for the US loans - required austerity at home in order to maximise export earnings, while Britain's colonies and other client states were required to keep their reserves in pounds as "sterling balances". Britain was still closely allied to France - with whom the Dunkirk Treaty was signed in 1947 - and both countries continued to be treated as major partners at international summits alongside the USA and USSR until Paris in 1960. Broadly speaking, all this remained Britain's foreign policy until the late 1950s, when the humiliation of the 1956 Suez Crisis and the economic revival of continental Europe, now united as the "Common Market", caused a reappraisal.

Bevin was unsentimental about the British Empire in places where the growth of nationalism had made direct rule no longer practical, and was part of the Cabinet which approved a speedy British withdrawal from India in 1947, and from other territories. Yet at this stage Britain still maintained a network of client states in the Middle East (Egypt until the early 1950s, Iraq and Jordan until the late 1950s), major bases in such places as Cyprus and Suez (until 1954) and expected to remain in control of parts of Africa for many more decades, Bevin approving the construction of a huge new base in East Africa.

Bevin, a determined anti-Communist, and critic of the Soviet Union. In 1946 during a conference, the Soviet foreign minister Molotov repeatedly attacked British proposals whilst defending Soviet policies, and in total frustration Bevin stood and lurched towards the minister whilst shouting "I've had enough of this "'ave!" before being restrained by security.^[7] He was a strong supporter of the United States in the early years of the Cold War and a leading advocate for British involvement in the Korean War. Two of the key institutions of the post-war world, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the Marshall Plan for aid to post-war Europe, were in considerable part the result of Bevin's efforts during these years. This policy, little different from that of the Conservatives ("Hasn't Anthony Eden grown fat?" as wags had it), was a source of frustration to some backbench Labour MPs, who early in the 1945 Parliament formed a "Keep Left" group to push for a more Left-Wing foreign policy.

In 1945, Bevin advocated the creation of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly, saying in the House of Commons that "There should be a study of a house directly elected by the people of the world to whom the nations are accountable." He also made a crucial intervention in the cabinet committee GEN 75, insisting that the United Kingdom should commit to developing an atomic bomb whatever the cost, because of the effect on Britain's international standing; Bevin's support was said to have swung the meeting.^[8]

Bevin was said to have defined his foreign policy as "to be able to take a ticket at Victoria station and go anywhere I damn well please!"^[9]

During the negotiations in Paris for the peace treaty of World War II, the Russian diplomat Vladimir Erofeev^[10] met Bevin. He was appalled by his behaviour, which he judged impolite and undiplomatic. According to Erofeev, at one meeting Bevin said that he saw no difference between Russia and Nazi Germany; he took his words back only when Molotov was on the verge of walking out. During a pause of the negotiations, all the delegates rushed to the toilet; he heard Bevin say, in a very loud voice: "This is the only means of production that will ever be in the hands of the working class."

Bevin, Palestine and Israel[link]

The security zone in Jerusalem was dubbed "Bevingrad" during Bevin's term in the Foreign Office

Bevin was Foreign Secretary during the period when the Mandate of Palestine ended and the State of Israel was created. Bevin failed to secure the stated British objectives in this area of foreign policy, which included a peaceful settlement of the situation and the avoidance of involuntary population transfers.

Regarding Bevin's handling of the Middle East situation, at least one commentator, David Leitch, has suggested that Bevin lacked diplomatic finesse.^[11] Leitch argued that Bevin tended to make a bad situation worse by making ill-chosen abrasive remarks. Bevin was undeniably a plain-spoken man, some of whose remarks struck many as insensitive. Jewish critics have accused him of being anti-Semitic. He earned the hatred of Zionists by refusing to remove limits on Jewish immigration to Palestine in the aftermath of the war. According to historian Howard Sachar, his political foe, Richard Crossman, a fellow Labour Party member of parliament and a pro-Zionist member of the post-war Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry into the Problems of European Jewry and Palestine, characterised his outlook during the dying days of the Mandate as "corresponding roughly with the Protocols of the Elders of Zion", the notorious hoax document which was designed to inflame anti-Semitic prejudice. In Sachar's account, Crossman intimated that "the main points of Bevin's discourse were ... that the Jews had successfully organised a conspiracy against Britain and against him personally."^[12][13] However, the Bevin biographer, Alan Bullock, rejected suggestions that Bevin was motivated by personal anti-Semitism.

Britain's economic weakness, and its dependence on the financial support of the United States (Britain had received a large American loan in 1946, and mid-1947 was to see the launching of the Marshall Plan), left him little alternative but to yield to American pressure over Palestine policy.

At the reconvened London Conference in January 1947, the Jewish negotiators were only prepared to accept partition and the Arab negotiators only a unitary state (which would automatically have had an Arab majority). Neither would accept limited autonomy under overall British rule. When no agreement could be reached, Bevin threatened to hand the problem over to the United Nations. The threat failed to move either side, the Jewish representatives because they believed that Bevin was bluffing and the Arabs because they believed that their cause would prevail before the General Assembly. Bevin accordingly announced that he would "ask the UN to take the Palestine question into consideration."^[14] A week later, the strategic rationale supporting Britain's retaining a presence in Palestine was removed when the intention to withdraw from India in August of that year was announced.^[14] The decision to allow the United Nations to determine Palestine's future was formalised by the Attlee government's public declaration in February 1947 that Britain's Mandate in Palestine had become "unworkable." Of the UN partition plan which resulted, Bevin commented: "The majority proposal is so manifestly unjust to the Arabs that it is difficult to see how we could reconcile it with our conscience."^[15] During the remainder of the Mandate, fighting between the Jewish and Arab communities intensified. The end of the Mandate and Britain's final withdrawal from Palestine was marked by the founding of the State of Israel and the start of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, when five Arab states intervened in the inter-communal fighting. The Arab armies were led by the state with that position which was most effective, Jordan, which, with British assent, had reached a secret agreement with the Israelis which limited the fighting between their two countries. The war ended with Israel, in addition to the territory assigned by the UN for the creation of a Jewish state, also in control of much of the Mandate territory which had been assigned by the UN for the creation of an Arab state. The remainder was divided between Jordan and Egypt. Hundreds of thousands of, overwhelmingly Arab, civilians had become displaced.

Bevin was infuriated by attacks on British troops carried out by the more extreme of the Jewish militant groups, the Irgun and Lehi, commonly known as the Stern Gang. The Haganah restricted itself to less direct attacks, further restricted after the King David Hotel bombing (for which it initially gave its authorisation; later, but unknown to the Irgun, withdrawn) to illegal immigration activities.^[14]

Bevin negotiated the "Portsmouth Treaty" with Iraq (signed on 15 January 1948), which, according to then-Iraqi foreign minister Muhammad Fadhel al-Jamali, was accompanied by a British undertaking to withdraw from Palestine in such a fashion as to provide for swift Arab occupation of all its territory."^[16]

In 1946, an Irgun plan to assassinate Bevin and other British politicians was foiled by the security service, MI5.^[17]

Later life[link]

Statue of Ernest Bevin in Southwark, South London

His health failing, Bevin reluctantly allowed himself to be moved to become Lord Privy Seal in March 1951. 'I am neither a Lord, nor a Privy, nor a Seal', he is said to have commented.^[18] He died the following month, still holding the key to his red box. His ashes are buried in Westminster Abbey.

When, on Stafford Cripps's death in 1952, Attlee (by this time Leader of the Opposition) was invited to broadcast a tribute by the BBC, he was looked after by announcer Frank Phillips. After the broadcast, Phillips took Attlee to the hospitality room for a drink and in order to make conversation said:

‘I suppose you will miss Sir Stafford, sir’.

Attlee fixed him with his eye: ’Did you know Ernie Bevin?'

‘I have met him, sir,’ Phillips replied.

‘There’s the man I miss’.

A statue commemorating Bevin stands opposite Devon Mansions and the former St Olave's Grammar School in Tooley Street, South London.

Legacy[link]

Bevin in office showed the same pragmatic stubbornness that had characterised his years as a trade union leader, and as one of the integral organisers of the Labour Party. Like Churchill, he was an old-fashioned English (as opposed to British) patriot, which was why the two leaders worked well together. But he was also an internationalist, a supporter of the American alliance and of European unity. He saw clearly that Britain's days of imperial greatness were over, something he did not regret, for, in his view, the working class had never benefited from the Empire.

For his critics, his most lasting legacy remains the failure of his Palestine policy.

See also[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Ernest Bevin

• Aneurin Bevan
• Ernest Bevin College
• Bevin Boys
• SS Exodus

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Alan Bullock's magisterial three-volume biography Life and Times of Ernest Bevin was re-published in a single-volume abridged version by Politicos Publishing in 2002.
• Denis MacShane contributed an essay on Bevin to the Dictionary of Labour Biography, Greg Rosen (ed), Politicos Publishing, 2001.

External links[link]

• Chanter, Alan; Peter Chen (2007). "WW2DB: Ernest Bevin". http://ww2db.com/person_bio.php?person_id=420. Retrieved 2007-11-04. 
• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Ernest-Bevin
• Peter Day. Jewish terrorists plotted to assassinate Ernest Bevin in 1946, The Sunday Times, March 5, 2006.
• British Security Service files on Jewish terrorist activities, The National Archives, released through Freedom of information legislation in March 2006.
• From the hedgerows of Devon to the Foreign Office - Roger Steer.
• Annotated bibliography for Ernest Bevin from the Alsos Digital Library for Nuclear Issues

v t e Foreign Secretaries of the United Kingdom Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Fox Grantham Fox Temple Leeds Grenville Hawkesbury Harrowby Mulgrave Fox Howick Canning Bathurst Wellesley Castlereagh Canning Dudley Aberdeen Palmerston Wellington Palmerston Aberdeen Palmerston Granville Malmesbury Russell Clarendon Malmesbury Russell Clarendon Stanley Clarendon Granville Derby Salisbury Granville Salisbury Rosebery Iddesleigh Salisbury Rosebery Kimberley Salisbury Lansdowne Grey Balfour Curzon MacDonald Chamberlain Henderson Reading Simon Hoare Eden Halifax Eden Bevin Morrison Eden Macmillan Lloyd Home Butler Gordon Walker Stewart Brown Stewart Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Stewart Douglas-Home Callaghan Crosland Owen Carrington Pym Howe Major Hurd Rifkind Cook Straw Beckett Miliband Hague Book:Secretaries of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Category:British Secretaries of State Portal:United Kingdom

v t e War Cabinet of Winston Churchill (May 1940–May 1945) Prime Minister Minister of Defence Winston Churchill (1940–1945) Deputy Prime Minister Clement Attlee (1942–1945) Lord President of the Council Neville Chamberlain (1940) Sir John Anderson (1940–1943) Clement Attlee (1943–1945) Lord Privy Seal Clement Attlee (1940–1942) Sir Stafford Cripps (1942) Chancellor of the Exchequer Sir Kingsley Wood (1940–1942) Sir John Anderson (1943–1945) Foreign Secretary Viscount Halifax (1940) Anthony Eden (1940–1945) Home Secretary Herbert Morrison (1940–1945) Minister of Aircraft Production Lord Beaverbrook (1940–1941) Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs Clement Attlee (1942–1943) Minister of Labour and National Service Ernest Bevin (1940–1945) Minister Resident Middle East Oliver Lyttelton (1942) Richard Casey (1942–1944) Lord Moyne (1944) Minister without Portfolio Arthur Greenwood (1940–1942) Minister of Reconstruction Lord Woolton (1943–1945) Minister of State Lord Beaverbrook (1941) Minister of Supply Lord Beaverbrook (1941–1942) Minister of Production Lord Beaverbrook (1942) Oliver Lyttelton (1942–1945)

Motorcycle cop redirects here.

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German state police officer in Hamburg

A Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer in the force's distinctive dress uniform.

Mounted Tourist-Police officers in Petra, Jordan.

A group of Garda officers in the Republic of Ireland.

A motor officer patrolling in Arizona on a motorcycle.

A police officer (also known as a policeman or policewoman, and constable in some forces, particularly in the United Kingdom^[1][2] and other Commonwealth nations) is a warranted employee of a police force. In the United States, "officer" is the formal name of the lowest police rank; in many other countries "officer" is a generic term not specifying a particular rank, and the lowest rank is often "constable". Police officers are generally charged with the apprehension of criminals and the prevention and detection of crime, and the maintenance of public order. Police officers may be sworn to an oath, and have the power to arrest people and detain them for a limited time, along with other duties and powers.

Some police officers may also be trained in special duties, such as counter-terrorism, surveillance, child protection, VIP protection, and investigation techniques into major crime, including fraud, rape, murder and drug trafficking.

Duties and functions[link]

Responsibilities of a police officer are varied, and may differ greatly from within one political context to another. Typical duties relate to keeping the peace, law enforcement, protection of people and property, and the investigation of crimes. Officers are expected to respond to a variety of situations that may arise while they are on duty. Rules and guidelines dictate how an officer should behave within the community, and in many contexts restrictions are placed on what the uniformed officer wears. In some countries, rules and procedures dictate that a police officer is obliged to intervene in a criminal incident, even if they are off-duty. Police officers in nearly all countries retain their lawful powers, while off duty.^[3]

In the community[link]

In the majority of Western legal systems, the major role of the police is to maintain order, keeping the peace through surveillance of the public, and the subsequent reporting and apprehension of suspected violators of the law. They also function to discourage crimes through high-visibility policing, and most police forces have an investigative capability. Police have the legal authority to arrest, usually granted by magistrates. Police officers also respond to emergency calls, along with routine community policing.

Police are often used as an emergency service and may provide a public safety function at large gatherings, as well as in emergencies, disasters, search and rescue situations, and Road Traffic Collisions. To provide a prompt response in emergencies, the police often coordinate their operations with fire and emergency medical services. In some countries, individuals serve jointly as police officers as well as firefighters (creating the role of Fire Police) or paramedics. In many countries, there is a common emergency service number that allows the police, firefighters, or medical services to be summoned to an emergency. Some countries, such as the United Kingdom have outlined command procedures, for the use in major emergencies or disorder. The Gold Silver Bronze command structure is a system set up to improve communications between ground based officers and the control room, typically, Bronze Commander would be a senior officer on the ground, coordinating the efforts in the center of the emergency, Silver Commanders would be positioned in an 'Incident Control Room' erected to improve better communications at the scene, and a Gold Commander who would be in the Control Room.

Police are also responsible for reprimanding minor offenders by issuing citations which typically may result in the imposition of fines, particularly for violations of traffic law. Traffic enforcement is often and effectively accomplished by police officers on motorcycles—called motor officers, these officers refer to the motorcycles they ride on duty as simply motors. Police are also trained to assist persons in distress, such as motorists whose car has broken down and people experiencing a medical emergency. Police are typically trained in basic first aid such as CPR.

In addition, some park rangers are commissioned as law enforcement officers and carry out a law-enforcement role within national parks and other back-country wilderness and recreational areas, whereas Military police perform law enforcement functions within the military.

Entry and promotion qualifications[link]

In most countries, candidates for the police force must have completed some formal education.^{[citation needed]} Increasing numbers of people are joining the police force who possess tertiary education^{[citation needed]} and in response to this many police forces have developed a "fast-track" scheme whereby those with university degrees spend two to three years as a Constable before receiving promotion to higher ranks, such as Sergeants or Inspectors. (Officers who work within investigative divisions or plainclothes are not necessarily of a higher rank but merely have different duties.)^{[citation needed]} Police officers are also recruited from those with experience in the military or security services. In the United States state laws may codify state-wide qualification standards regarding age, education, criminal record, and training but in other places requirements are set by local police agencies. Each local Police agency has different requirements.

Officers of the Polizia Municipale from Piacenza, Italy

Promotion is not automatic and usually requires the candidate to pass some kind of examination, interview board or other selection procedure. Although promotion normally includes an increase in salary, it also brings with it an increase in responsibility and for most, an increase in administrative paperwork. There is no stigma attached to this, as experienced line patrol officers are highly regarded.

Dependent upon each agency, but generally after completing two years of service, officers may also apply for specialist positions, such as detective, police dog handler, mounted police officer, motorcycle officer, water police officer, or firearms officer (in countries where police are not routinely armed).

In some countries such as in Singapore, police ranks may also be supplemented through conscription, similar to national service in the military. Qualifications may thus be relaxed or enhanced depending on the target mix of conscripts. In Singapore, for example, conscripts face tougher physical requirements in areas such as eyesight, but are less stringent with minimum academic qualification requirements. Some police officers join as volunteers, who again may do so via differing qualification requirements.

Police pay[link]

This section requires expansion.

In some societies, police officers are paid relatively well compared to other occupations; their pay depends on what rank they are within their police force and how many years they've served.^[4]

Occupational hazards[link]

Line of duty deaths[link]

Memorial to a fallen police officer at the Texas Department of Public Safety Houston Webster Office in Houston^[5]

Line of duty deaths are deaths which occur while an officer is conducting his or her appointed duties. Despite the increased risk of being a victim of a homicide, automobile accidents are the most common cause of officer deaths. Officers are more likely to be involved in traffic accidents because of their large amount of time spent conducting vehicle patrols, or directing traffic, as well as their work outside their vehicles alongside or on the roadway, or in dangerous pursuits. Officers killed by suspects make up a smaller proportion of deaths. In the U.S. in 2005, 156 line of duty deaths were recorded of which 44% were from assaults on officers, 35% vehicle related (only 3% during vehicular pursuits) and the rest from other causes: heart attacks during arrests/foot pursuits, diseases contracted either from suspects' body fluids or, more rarely, from emergency blood transfusions received after being in motor vehicle accidents, shot or stabbed, accidental gun discharges, falls, and drownings.^[6]

Police officers who die in the line of duty, especially those who die from the actions of suspects or in accidents or heart attacks, are often given elaborate funerals, attended by large numbers of fellow officers. Their families may also be entitled to special pensions. Fallen officers are often remembered in public memorials, such as the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in the U.S., the National Police Memorial in the U.K. and the Scottish Police Memorial, at the Scottish Police College.

In the United Kingdom, in the 10 years from April 2000 there were 143 line of duty deaths: 54 in road accidents travelling to or from duty, 46 in road accidents on duty, 23 from natural causes on duty, 15 from criminal acts, and 5 in other accidents.^[7] (In the United Kingdom, police do not normally carry firearms.)

The Singapore Police Force registered just over 100 deaths in a century up to the year 2000. There have been 28 New Zealand police officers killed by criminal act since 1890.^[8] Despite perceived dangers, policing has never been listed above number ten as one of the most dangerous jobs in the U.S. In terms of deaths per capita, driver-sales work such as food delivery is a more dangerous profession than being a police officer^[9].

Work stress[link]

Indicators[link]

The actual presence of stress in police work is well documented and evidenced by certain statistics. Researchers typically use suicide, divorce and alcoholism rates as three key indexes of stress in a group of people.^[10] These factors paint a compelling picture of police officers demonstrating signs of significant stress, for example:

• A study in the United States, by National Surveillance of Police Suicide Study (NSOPS), showed 141 suicides in 2008 and 143 in 2009. This yields a suicide rate of 17/100,000, a figure that holds up under scrutiny and is consistent with CDC/NOMS data.^[11] The overall suicide rate in the United States was 11.3 suicide deaths per 100,000 people.^[12] There is some speculation or controversy that this official rate may understate the actual rate as it is often other police officers that report facts that lead to a cause of death determination, and death benefits, institutional image, and other factors may be incentives to misreport incident facts. It is speculated that some suicides are reported by fellow officers as accidents or as deaths in the line of duty perpetrated by unknown assailants. Also, many jurisdictions simply don't keep suicide statistics. Even though the information is incomplete, the available statistics suggest that police officers are more likely to commit suicide than the general population. However there is still controversy in the interpretation of these statistics. When comparisons are made within age, gender, and racial cohorts, the differences are much less dramatic.^[13][14] Although suicides may be notably more prevalent among police, it is not clear whether police suicides are the result of work stress or the consequence of other variables, such as the influence of a subculture of violence^[15]
• Police officers are much more likely to experience interpersonal relationship problems. Relationship problems are most dramatically demonstrated by the divorce rate among police officers, which is usually reported as being the second highest of all occupations. However in a 2009 study, the divorce rates of law enforcement personnel were compared with the rates for other occupations, where data was analyzed from the 2000 U.S. Census. The results of the analysis indicate that the divorce rate for law enforcement personnel is lower than that of the general population, even after controlling for demographic and other job-related variables.^[16] The propensity to domestic violence is also thought to be higher for police officers than the general population, though the statistics are very fuzzy and controversial. Police officers also seem to have relationship problems at work, typically with superiors or with political oversight, though the evidence is largely anecdotal and controversial.
• Alcoholism is considered another aberrant statistic for police officers. Although the statistics are fuzzy, clinically treated alcohol addiction rates are usually calculated to be about twice as high for police officers than for the general population in the United States. In contrast, statistics documenting alcohol abuse are less precise. Rates for arrest for driving under the influence of alcohol, or DUI or DWI, are somewhat higher for police officers than for other drivers, but the statistics are not widely trusted outside of the insurance industry since it is other police officers that make DUI arrests. Some departments and even some individual officers tend to hold police officers to a higher behavioral and ethical standard while others will recognize a 'blue line' behind which those within the 'brotherhood' are not held to the same standards as the rest of society. Despite the controversies in the interpretation of the statistics, it is generally considered evident that police officers are more susceptible to alcohol abuse than other occupations. The same conclusions are usually made regarding the police abuse of other substances, though the statistics are even less accurate, and even though the higher rates of substance abuse may be due in part to the more ready access to drugs and the more permissive atmosphere 'behind the blue line' rather than to occupational stresses.

Hans Selye, the foremost researcher in stress in the world, said that police work is "the most stressful occupation in America even surpassing the formidable stresses of air traffic control."^[10]

Other researchers, though, claim that police officers are more psychologically healthy than the general population. Police officers are increasingly more educated, more likely to engage in a regular program of exercise and to consume less alcohol and tobacco, and increasingly family-oriented. Healthy behavior patterns typically observed at entry training usually continue throughout the career of an officer. Even though the presence of occupation related stress seems to be well documented, it is highly controversial. Many within the law enforcement industry claim the propagation of incorrect suicide, divorce, and substance abuse statistics comes from people or organizations with political or social agendas, and that the presence of these beliefs within the industry makes it hard for health workers to help police officers in need of treatment to deal with the fear of negative consequences from police work which is necessary to enable police officers to develop a healthy expectancy of success in treatment.^[17]

Sources[link]

Even though the presence of occupational stresses appear to be well documented, though not without controversy, the causes of workplace stress are comparatively unclear or even a matter of conjecture.

Although individual policemen and institutional public relations typically cite the risks of being killed in the line of duty as the predominant source of stress for individual policemen, there is significant controversy regarding the causes of personal workplace stress due to the fact that the actual risk of being killed is so small relative to other occupations.

It is charged that the myth of the high risks of occupational mortality connected with police work is often propagated by the law enforcement community as part of its institutional advancement and a central element in its public relations. Actual homicides of police are comparatively rare, but the reports of such incidents are typically reported in the press along with quotes by police officials or police officer family members stressing the notion that police officers 'put their lives on the line for the public' or 'risk their lives everyday', making it look like individual policemen routinely place themselves in mortal danger for low pay and little recognition, and that the view of police work as 'combat' is the source of police occupational stress indications.

Another explanation often advanced is the idea that police officers will undergo some traumatic experience in their police work that they never recover from, leading to suicide, divorce, etc. However, since the effects of such traumatic stresses is readily recognized, there are usually proactive programs in place to help individual police officers deal with the psychological effects of a traumatic event. Unfortunately, there is some evidence that such programs are actually ineffective, especially group therapies, may re-traumatize the participant, weaken coping mechanisms, and contribute to the development of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).^[18][19][20]

Observations where police officers and other emergency workers, such as firemen, experience the same traumatic event, it is more likely that the police officer will have difficulty dealing with the long term emotional effects of the traumatic event. On this observation, some of the academic literature suggests that along these lines the causes of occupational stress is more complex for police officers. Stress in police work is often present in other occupations, but not in an ongoing capacity. One line of thinking is that the individual stresses of police work produce a condition of chronic stress. Police officers encounter stressors in call after call which sap their emotional strength. Debilitation from this daily stress accumulates making officers more vulnerable to traumatic incidents and normal pressures of life. The weakening process is often too slow to see; neither a person nor his friends are aware of the damage being done. The effects of chronic stresses is two-fold:

• First, prolonged stress causes people to regress. Their psychological growth reverses, and they become more immature. They rapidly become more childish and primitive, much like a person being sick for several days becoming more irritable and childish in its demands on other people.
• Second, chronic stress numbs people's sensitivity. They can't stand to continually see human misery. They must stop feeling or they won't survive. The mind has this defense mechanism so people can continue working in horrible situations. If they kept their normal sensitivity, they would fall apart. As they become insensitive to their own suffering, they become insensitive to the suffering of others. When treated with indignity, they lose not only a sense of their own dignity but also the dignity of others. The pain of others stops bothering them, and they are no longer bothered when they hurt others.

The daily work of a police officer involves certain paradoxes and conflicts which may be difficult to deal with, the predominant examples are^[10]

• Any interaction with a member of the public, whether socially or officially, such as in a traffic stop, involves a non-trivial risk of verbal abuse or physical harm. Treating a person with common respect or normal social graces requires the officer to be off guard and unprepared for an attack. Being on guard for an attack and treating every interpersonal situation with safety procedures and affirmative commands makes the police officer appear cynical, brutal, and detached, and limits his actual effectiveness with the public. Considering someone a friend or an enemy produces opposite mental states, an unnatural no-win situation engendering chronic stress.
• A police department is both a professional and military organization, and these two aspects oppose each other. As a professional, he is considered to be an expert in his field and is expected to use his expertise for the good of his public. He has much discretion in how he serves the people who call upon him. However, the dangers and complexities of the work require a military structure of the organization and a military leaning in the training. Although some are actually educated, all police officers are well trained. Policies, regulations, and procedures cover every facet of police work. Everything is expected to be done by the book with substantial repercussions, including civil and criminal liability, for varying from the expectations of operating procedures. Often the facts of a situation require a course of action that does not follow procedures. If he follows procedures exactly, he knows he won't fully help the public, and the public will think he is shirking his responsibility. If the officer follows his own judgment, he is taking a risk. The community and department expect officers to use judgment, but when they do, there is a danger they will be disciplined; another unnatural no-win situation engendering chronic stress.
• Police officers tend to become socially isolated. The reasons given for this isolation are varied and mostly anecdotal. One theory is that police work is not balanced. Most occupations involve a combination of good and bad results. In police work, almost everything is bad, and everybody you deal with is perceived either inherently bad or at least foolish. Another is that police officers develop a 'street wisdom' and by fiat possess a degree of authority that tends to make them perceive themselves as being morally superior to the rest of society. Whatever the reason, the public that the police deal with clearly perceive it and tend to reinforce the divide. Classically when a group of people are isolated, they become disoriented and confused. Their behavior changes drastically. Ironically an isolated class are usually the ones who are losing real world wisdom and tend to judge the world incorrectly from a very limited perspective, leading to interpersonal mistakes and more chronic stress.^{[citation needed]}

A more colloquial view looks at specific sources of stress in police work.^[21] The sources of stress most often actually cited are:

• The fear of killing someone in the line of duty.
• Having your partner or somebody else that you feel at least partly responsible for killed in the line of duty.
• Lack of support by the department or superiors.
• The scheduling of work and irregular work demands resulting in a disruption of family time or family events or rituals.
• The daily grind of dealing with the stupidity of the public, or the "asshole factor".

Other more academic studies have produced similar lists, but may include items that the more colloquial surveys do not reveal, such as 'exposure to neglected, battered, or dead children'^[22]

Again, the actual fear of occupational death or physical harm is not high on the list of stress sources.

There have been numerous academic studies on the specific sources of police stress, and most conclude organizational culture and workload as the key issues in officer stress.^[23] Traumatic events are usually concluded to not be of sufficient scope or prevalence to account for prevalence of suicide, divorce, and substance abuse abnormalities.

Personality theories[link]

Some of the more esoteric, least documented or cited, and more longstanding theories for police stress symptoms involves the interaction of the specifics of police work with the personalities of individual police officers. There has been a raging debate on the fringes of psychiatry as to whether there is something about police work that causes psychiatric symptomology and personality disorders or whether there are certain personalities susceptible to disorders that are attracted to police work. Theory holds that there are four general possibilities:

• There is something about police work, the social structure, the work atmosphere, etc., which causes stresses or presents traumas that cause personality or psychiatric disorders resulting in symptoms such as suicide, divorce, violence, substance abuse, etc. (the foundations of this possibility are outlined above)
• There is one or more personality types or people with certain tendencies or proclivities who are susceptible of developing personality or psychiatric disorders, regardless of their occupation, who because of their personality or preferences are attracted to police work, and then display symptoms of stress or disorders.
• There is a combination of the two.
• Or there is a combination and synergistic interaction of the two.

Some studies have tried to use personality traits to determine police applicant desirability,^[24]. These have generally looked at psychology's Big Five personality traits of openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism. These studies have suggested that age, cynicism and institutional culture affect performance.

There are other personality traits that are specifically not desired for police work that are equally well documented. However, there has been relatively little academic work cited regarding the personality traits attracted to police work. The nature of personality traits of people attracted to police work tends to be a matter of conjecture and anecdotal observations. The personalities of people who are actually in police work tends to be different from that which is purported to be desired by police departments. Police officers tend to be isolated and suspicious, view expression of emotions as a weakness, and find it hard to trust and confide in others.^[25] For example, police officers are often viewed by the public to be domineering, narcissistic, authoritarian, physically oppressive, and basically the opposite of the personality traits most often cited as being desirable in a police officer. There are studies that suggest that people who take risks are attracted to police work.^[26] There is a corresponding theory that police officers actually tend to be people seeking security and stability and are attracted to the job for the steady government paycheck and government pension and adverse to the risks of business, sales, or other occupations. There is ample evidence that there is something in police work that alters personality.

The theory that there is an interaction between the personality attracted to the work and the work itself is mostly conjecture. For example, people attracted to police work are thought to crave the respect and authority that they expect with a badge, gun, uniform, and commission, but most of the people that police officers come in contact with do not respect them, and their authority is strongly regulated and limited by law, policies, and procedures, setting up a conflict resulting in chronic stress.

Abuse of power[link]

Police officers have considerable powers and are often supported by authorities who oversee them if accused of wrongdoing.^[27]

Systematic cases[link]

In dictatorial, corrupt, or weak states, police officers may carry out many criminal acts for the ruling regime with impunity. Examples are the Gestapo secret police in Nazi Germany, and the role of the police in the military dictatorship in Argentina in the 1970s.^[28] Institutional racism has been found in modern police forces.^[29]

Individual cases[link]

Individual officers, or sometimes whole units, can be corrupt or carry out various other forms of misconduct; this occasionally happens in many forces, but is particularly problematic where police pay is very low unless supplemented by bribes.^[30] Police sometimes act with unwarranted brutality when they overreact to confrontational situations,^[31] to extract a confession from a person they may or may not genuinely suspect of being guilty,^[32] or in other circumstances. Instances of racism occur, even when the police force as a whole is not found to be racist.^[33]

See also[link]

• The Thin Blue Line (emblem)
• Cops (TV series)
• Fictional police officers
• Field Training Officer
• List of slang terms for police officers
• Military police
• Peace officer
• Police brutality
• Police rank
• Police procedural
• President Grover Cleveland—former Sheriff of Erie County, New York
• President Theodore Roosevelt—Deputy Sheriff in the Dakota Territory, and New York City Police Commissioner

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Police officers

• Thin Blue Line Emblem
• http://www.discoverpolicing.org
• Metropolitan Police history
• http://www.newscotlandyard.police.uk/foi/pdfs/other_information/corporate/operational_uniform_and_equipment.pdf
• http://www.west-midlands.police.uk/publications/freedom-of-information/policy.asp?id=144
• http://www.gmp.police.uk/mainsite/pages/pcsouniform.htm,ts=2
• http://www.policelink.com