Students join police for public order training exercise

Volunteers from the University of Northampton and Northampton College joined offices from Northamptonshire Police for a public order training exercise this week.

The volunteers, which also included police staff, special constables and cadets, took part in the event which was held at an industrial warehouse in Earls Barton on Wednesday (November 2).

Northamptonshire Police’s lead instructor for operations training, James Harris, said: “Exercises like this are necessary to test the capabilities of our public order resources to ensure we minimise the risk to the public, while maximising the safety of our officers.

“The volunteers added a much-needed level of realism and ensured the officers involved could experience different crowd psychology and dynamics in a safe environment.

“I’d like to genuinely and sincerely thank everyone involved in the planning, preparation and delivery of this event and to all those that took part, both officers and volunteers, for making this such a safe and positive experience.”

Northamptonshire Police officers who are trained to deal with both public order and public safety incidents could be deployed across the county, but also across the country in partnership with other forces.

They are utilised to deal with pre-planned and spontaneous events where people potentially pose a significant risk to themselves or others and at large scale sporting and high-profile national and international events.