How verbal and physical abuse drove me out of the police

The past decade has not been kind to those we entrust, in the words of Sir Robert Peel, ‘to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen’. Since 2010, police numbers have fallen by more than 20,000, with too many choosing to leave the force owing to physical and emotional assaults in a stressed and underfunded job.

I can sympathise, because I had to step away from the front line and the job I loved three years ago. At the time, friends and family repeatedly asked me why I felt I had to leave. Set against the latest news of escalating assaults on police, I’m not so sure they’d ask now.

There were approximately 31,000 assaults on officers last year, an increase of almost 5,000 on the year before. Barely any make the news — despite the stab and slash wounds, broken bones and close calls.

The past fortnight has been especially cruel — and has exposed the risks that police officers face.