- Norman Bettison
-
Sir Norman George Bettison Born 3 January 1956
Rotherham, South YorkshireOccupation Police Officer ACPO Sir Norman George Bettison, QPM (born 3 January 1956) is a British police officer and the current Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police.
Contents
Education
Bettison was born in Rotherham, South Yorkshire. He left school at the age of 16 to join South Yorkshire Police as a cadet. He later attended university, obtaining an M.A. in philosophy and psychology from the University of Oxford, and another master's degree in business administration and media studies from Sheffield Hallam University.[1]
Career
Bettison began his police career in 1975 when he joined South Yorkshire Police as a Constable. He served through the ranks, and in 1993 was appointed Assistant Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police.[2]
Chief Constable of Merseyside Police
He left West Yorkshire in 1998 to become Chief Constable of Merseyside Police. A member of Merseyside Police Authority, Councillor Steve Foulkes, said the appointment had caused outrage among the families of the victims of the 1989 Hillsborough disaster, because Bettison had been involved in the investigation, which had been controversial.[3] Bettison offered to meet the families to defuse the controversy.[4]
Chief Executive of Centrex
He retired from the police in January 2005 to become Chief Executive of Centrex, which provided training and development to police forces in the UK and enforcement agencies throughout the world until it was abolished in March 2007.[5][6]
Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police
He rejoined the police service in January 2007 as Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police.[7] He attempted to secure a package to receive both a retirement pension from Merseyside and a salary from the new post; he threatened legal action but the claim was settled out of court.[8]
Shortly after taking office as Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police, Sir Norman ordered a review of shifts worked by officers claiming they did not provide the best service to the public as they included four rest days when officers were not at work.[9] A new shift pattern consisting of two distinct patterns referred to as VSA 1 and VSA 2 (variable shift arrangement) was produced and commenced in March 2008. Response officers worked VSA 1 and neighbourhood policing teams worked VSA 2. Interestingly, the VSA 2 still included four rest days for officers. Officers posted to Communications Division were allowed to continue working the more popular previous shift pattern, FSDR (Force Standard Duty Rosta) as Communications Division had been able to successfully argue that VSA was not fit for purpose for their requirements. The VSA 1 proved deeply unpopular with many officers claiming that they were more tired than they had been working the previous shift pattern. A report leaked from the Police Federation to local media suggested that there had been an increase of 16,000 hours of sickness between April and August 2008, a 3.4% increase on the previous year.[10] After pressure by the police federation a further review was taken and VSA 1 was re-designed and commenced in April 2009. Many officers remain unconvinced as to the need to deviate from the FSDR shift pattern which had allowed West Yorkshire Police to achieve 'very significant performance gains' and be regarded as one of the most improved forces.[11][12]
Media statements
In October 2008, Bettison was touted as a possible replacement for Sir Ian Blair as Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, but ruled himself out of consideration citing the politicisation of the role and the way Blair was removed. He warned of "dangerous consequences" if the independence of chief constables were lost, saying "I am not prepared to set aside my professional judgement and integrity, forged over 36 years, in order to meet short-term political expediency" and warning of "the ambition which seems to be shared by all three major political parties at the moment... to make the police service more accountable to elected representatives. What that means is bringing the police service under greater political control."[13]
On 12 April 2010 Bettison wrote an article in The Times saying "I'm not worth £213,000"; his annual cost to the tax payer when pensions and benefits are considered. He criticized the notion, in the National Health Service and other government bureaus, that public sector organisations had to offer wages for senior managers comparable to those for private industry, or that businesspeople should be brought in to conduct strategic reviews of public agencies. Instead, he wrote, "People join, and remain in, the public sector because of a sense of vocation — to make a difference to society or to the quality of people’s lives. The best leaders are those who can secure long-term public value and a vision for their staff. Not some mercenary performance manager peddling a short-term fix." Thus he suggested freezing public sector pay, without exceptions, beginning with the highest wage earners, which he felt in combination with a 50p in the pound increase in taxes for higher earners and the removal of all tax allowances would sustain public services.[14]
In an article for the Yorkshire Post, Bettison wrote that over-zealous health and safety officials were making the jobs of his front line officers increasingly more demanding, branding them "the health and safety Taliban". He described feeling that he was "pushing the boundaries" by commending a police officer who jumped into a canal to save a suicidal man, due to the officer's personal risk, and that in another case police and ambulance crews failed to save two shooting victims after being delayed 20 minutes, because it is "genuinely easier, in that kind of environment, to do nothing. We are not trained, equipped, practised or informed sufficiently for this or that particular scenario." He also described the conviction of Metropolitan Police for the death of Jean Charles de Menezes as "A triumph for health and safety, a lucrative new territory for lawyers, a disaster for common sense."[15]
Honours
Bettison was made an Honorary Fellow of Liverpool John Moores University in 2004.[16] In the Millennium New Year's Honours list, he was awarded the Queen's Police Medal,[17] and was knighted in 2006.[18]
References
- ^ "Chief Constable Sir Norman Bettison", West Yorkshire Police.
- ^ Yorkshire Post Newspaper article - 8 February 1993 (appointment)/1 May 1993 (start date).
- ^ "Pressure grows on Merseyside police chief", BBC News, 9 November 1998.
- ^ Bunyan, Nigel. "Police chief will meet Hillsborough families 'anytime, anywhere'", The Daily Telegraph, 16 November 1998.
- "Police chief rejects Hillsborough claims", BBC News, 16 November 1998.
- ^ Centrex Annual Report-2005-2006.
- ^ "Will Bettison be the new head at Scotland Yard?", Liverpool Echo, 16 November 2007
- ^ Securzine - Weekly Newspaper for Security Supplies
- ^ Police chief in legal battle to take pension on top of pay The Times, 21 December 2007
- ^ http://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/West-Yorkshire-Police-chief39s-DVD.3201336.jp "West Yorkshire Police chief's DVD talk: 'Your shifts must change'", Yorkshire Evening Post, 14 September 2007.
- ^ http://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/New-shifts-hit-W-Yorks.4564377.jp "New shifts hit W Yorks police morale", Yorkshire Evening Post, 7 October 2008.
- ^ http://police.homeoffice.gov.uk/performance-and-measurement/performance-assessment/assessments-2006-2007/west-yorkshire "Police Force Assessments West Yorkshire 2004/2005", Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary, 2004-2005.
- ^ http://police.homeoffice.gov.uk/performance-and-measurement/performance-assessment/assessments-2004-2005/west-yorkshire "Police Force Assessments West Yorkshire 2005/2006", Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary, 2005-2006.
- ^ "Police Chief Rules Out Met Role", BBC, 3 October 2008.
- ^ Bettison, Norman (12 April 2010). "I’m not worth £213,000. This wage bill is mad". Times Newspapers Ltd. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article7094782.ece. Retrieved 27 April 2010.
- ^ "Our police officers are at the mercy of Britain's health and safety Taliban". http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/opinion/Norman-Bettison-Our-police-officers.3450691.jp.
- ^ Liverpool Echo, May 2004.
- ^ BBC Birthday Honours List 2000
- ^ Telegraph Newspaper : Knights Bachelor (PDF)
External links
Police appointments Preceded by
Sir James SharplesChief Constable of Merseyside Police
1998 – 2004Succeeded by
Bernard Hogan-HowePreceded by
Colin CramphornChief Constable of West Yorkshire Police
2007 –Incumbent Categories:- 1956 births
- Living people
- People from Rotherham
- British Chief Constables
- Knights Bachelor
- Recipients of the Queen's Police Medal
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
