The damning investigation from the Metropolitan Police Federation said unarmoured vans and minibuses hired to ferry officers to trouble spots offered little protection from projectiles, were too small to carry riot shields, had no radios and had doors that could not be locked. A separate shortage of riot shields and defective batons exposed officers to similar levels of unnecessary risk, the report said. Officers also ran out of water and suffered from faulty radios while some were forced to work for 31 days straight in August due to the rioting, the survey of 8,500 officers found. Forty-five per cent of those surveyed said they suffered fatigue during the riots while 16 per cent reported symptoms of stress. 'These symptoms could have had an effect on the command and control process of police deployments,' the report's authors wrote. 'It was clear that many officers were angry at the way their safety and welfare had been compromised through protracted tours of duty with insufficient or defective equipment and little welfare support.' Federation chairman Peter Smyth said: 'Met bosses must, as a matter of urgency, ensure that enough properly equipped vehicles are available for deployment. 'The use of so many hire vehicles in particular was staggeringly inappropriate for the role they had to play, leaving officers in these vehicles with little projection from projectiles or the rioters themselves. 'All police officers understand the exceptional nature of the riots, which is why so many of us were willing to give 110 per cent during the crisis - working for weeks without days off and sleeping on station floors. 'But it is completely unacceptable when a lack of safe equipment left officers at real risk of unnecessary harm during their duties or unable to help colleagues in danger.' Almost 4,000 people were arrested after rioting broke out across London and other English cities last August. At least the first night of rioting on August 6 was sparked by the shooting of Mark Duggan in Tottenham, north London, by armed police officers two days earlier.
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Wednesday, 7 March 2012
London riots police 'used school minibuses to reach trouble spots'
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