Cost of Policing at the Gate

[Mr Popodopolous]

So I saw the West Ham thread and it jogged my memory on an article I read the other week. Yes it was the other side in Bristol but the cost of policing for us vs London clubs under the Met- some figures.

Astonishing when you consider the differentials in attendance, let alone cash swilling about the Premier League. West Ham fans are not exactly angels either eh?

As of 2015/16, according to an article figures apparently FOI based:

Quote

 

According to FoI data, Bristol City paid Avon and Somerset Constabulary £273,000 to supply officers to Ashton Gate last season, and Bristol Rovers paid the force £91,000 to police the Memorial Ground.

 

In comparison, Premier League team Tottenham Hotspur paid £48,000, Arsenal £32,000 and West Ham £12,500 to the Metropolitan Police during the 2015/16 season.

 

 

Can anyone more ITK explain this? Am I being naive, how can we pay nearly THREE times Tottenham, Arsenal and West Ham combined for policing our games which were fairly untroubled last year in the main?? West Ham had trouble last season, not least v Man U that crazy final Upton Park game...£12.5k for policing what?? Scandalous disparity on the face of it eh.

 

[Benjam!n Ultra]

'Cause our fans are solid son. People need protecting and quite rightly too. 

[Mr Popodopolous]

:laugh: those section 82ers up to their old tricks again eh?

Joking aside, and that was just joshing- To me anyway costs seem exorbitant well a bit exorbitant anyway, excessive yep absolutely. Interested to know what people think tbh.

[WhistleHappy]

£11000 + per match ....  bugger, we could get Nicky Hunt and Bas Savage back for that kinda money.

 

(ridiculous disparity of policing costs though, I thought extortion and protection rackets were against the law?.. (are London clubs policing costs subsidised by council tax perhaps?) if not I can't think why a A&S copper should cost that much more than a Met)

[Renaissance Williams]

Living in Bristol is approximately twelve times better than living in Alf Garnett Land. Price seems right to me.......

[Mr Popodopolous]

14 minutes ago, WhistleHappy said:

£11000 + per match ....  bugger, we could get Nicky Hunt and Bas Savage back for that kinda money.

 

(ridiculous disparity of policing costs though, I thought extortion and protection rackets were against the law?.. (are London clubs policing costs subsidised by council tax perhaps?) if not I can't think why a A&S copper should cost that much more than a Met)

Bizarrely I have seen Devon & Cornwall quite often at AG lately so the exact force, well who knows. Mixture of the two maybe?

If London clubs were subsidised by council tax, well I mean- even more exorbitant. I suppose some London councils have a lot of cash swilling about but is really odd all the same the rate.

£12.5k for West Ham really stands out for me- they paid in a season not much more than we pay in a game. Despite 35k average attendance to our (talking last season) half that maybe?

[Stephen Lewis]

Face it a protection racket is being run.

If you don't pay you don't get to play.

 

[Robbored]

About 10 years when Sexstone was at AG he told me that it cost the club £50 per hour per copper to police matches. A police shift that's 8 hours would be £400 for every police officer on duty. That adds up to a substantial sum over a season   No doubt it's even more these days.

Why the London clubs aren't charged as much must be down to the stewarding systems they employ. I know that West Ham use a private company to provide stewards so I guess other clubs do something similar. 

[Mad Cyril]

Never mind the difference to West Ham, why the hell do Rovers only get charged a third of what we pay??

Is this because Avon & Somerset no longer deploy the mounted section to Horfield as it's too dangerous?

[Unan]

Pretty sure most 'top' clubs employ the minimum police & then hire stewards privately.

[Cider Queen]

What was interesting was the A&S police said that it was a higher cost due to the old style grounds therefore more difficult to police/segregate. They indicated that new grounds were easier as ofter away fan were house in a stand of their own or at least an area of the ground with decent segregation. 

City had said that they expect their policing cost to significantly reduce now the ground was complete!

[cidered abroad]

Is it the cost of those police who are inside the stadium? I have always understood that the Plod outside the stadium are not paid for by the club.

When I see the numbers around the stadium, not inside, for low risk matches, I believe that Avon & Somerset are over policing. If they are all paid for by Club, it could be that A&S up the numbers to provide overtime for their lot without paying for it. Cynical sod aren't I.

[Robbored]

7 minutes ago, cidered abroad said:

Is it the cost of those police who are inside the stadium? I have always understood that the Plod outside the stadium are not paid for by the club.

When I see the numbers around the stadium, not inside, for low risk matches, I believe that Avon & Somerset are over policing. If they are all paid for by Club, 

There are very few police officers inside AG these days. In fact I'm trying to remember th last time I saw a police uniform inside the stadium. The "policing" inside AG is done my our own stewards.

Like others I've been surprised at just how many coppers there are outside AG these days including mounted ones - twe used to see them under the open Dolman as was.

[Bar BS3]

That is utterly ridiculous. 

I thought (last time I heard anything about it) that we had several police free matches nowadays. 

I guess this is why the club have been recruiting in house stewards teams. Maybe that negates the need for such high policing levels at about a 3rd of the cost. 

[cidered abroad]

10 minutes ago, Bar BS3 said:

That is utterly ridiculous. 

I thought (last time I heard anything about it) that we had several police free matches nowadays. 

I guess this is why the club have been recruiting in house stewards teams. Maybe that negates the need for such high policing levels at about a 3rd of the cost. 

But are we being forced by A&S Plod to pay for those on duty outside the stadium?

[CotswoldRed]

No need for them to have speed cameras around Bristol when they charge that much.

[phantom]

1 hour ago, Robbored said:

There are very few police officers inside AG these days. In fact I'm trying to remember th last time I saw a police uniform inside the stadium. The "policing" inside AG is done my our own stewards.

@Robbored There were 5/6 between the Atyeo and LL stand on Saturday

Will be interesting to see what happens at AG8 now "safe and sound" (the irony) have been given the heave ho! and City are starting to interview for their own stewards

[Bar BS3]

3 minutes ago, cidered abroad said:

But are we being forced by A&S Plod to pay for those on duty outside the stadium?

We must be. Like I said, there certainly were games that have been police free in the past. 

At the end of the day, if they say you need Xxx police for that fixture to comply with your safety certificate, then there isn't much you can do. But the inconsistency with those figures is shocking! 

[Mr Popodopolous]

Devon and Cornwall do our home games. Look out for their vans/uniforms.

Why do West Ham and others have so few police then?

As for Safe and Sound what will change when stewards in-house? New uniform sure. Beyond that? Who knows.

[Son of Fred]

9 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

those section 82ers up to their old tricks again eh?

Joking aside, and that was just joshing- To me anyway costs seem exorbitant well a bit exorbitant anyway, excessive yep absolutely. Interested to know what people think tbh.

They need to pay for their expensive and regular 'mistakes'..

[Slacker]

14 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Bizarrely I have seen Devon & Cornwall quite often at AG lately so the exact force, well who knows. Mixture of the two maybe?

If London clubs were subsidised by council tax, well I mean- even more exorbitant. I suppose some London councils have a lot of cash swilling about but is really odd all the same the rate.

£12.5k for West Ham really stands out for me- they paid in a season not much more than we pay in a game. Despite 35k average attendance to our (talking last season) half that maybe?

Blimey Pops!You must have good eyesight.Why are pelicans so expensive anyway?

 

[Drew Peacock]

5 hours ago, cidered abroad said:

But are we being forced by A&S Plod to pay for those on duty outside the stadium?

I believe a few seasons ago Leeds Utd took the Yorkshire Police to court and had it established that policing costs outside the stadium should not be borne by the club.  Perhaps one of our legal experts can confirm this and confirm it is now case law.

[BigTone]

10 hours ago, Robbored said:

About 10 years when Sexstone was at AG he told me that it cost the club £50 per hour per copper to police matches. A police shift that's 8 hours would be £400 for every police officer on duty. That adds up to a substantial sum over a season   No doubt it's even more these days.

Why the London clubs aren't charged as much must be down to the stewarding systems they employ. I know that West Ham use a private company to provide stewards so I guess other clubs do something similar. 

It would be interesting to see what they pay for Stewards in comparison to us to get the full picture

[22A]

18 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Can anyone more ITK explain this? Am I being naive, how can we pay nearly THREE times Tottenham, Arsenal and West Ham combined for policing our games which were fairly untroubled last year in the main??
 

The Police decide how much to charge per officer.

The Police decide how many officers are needed.

If the club disagrees with either figure, the Police withdraw the Safety Certificate and the game cannot go ahead.

 

[Robbored]

12 minutes ago, BigTone said:

It would be interesting to see what they pay for Stewards in comparison to us to get the full picture

My son worked at AG as a steward around 4 or 5 seasons ago and he was paid £15 per match. Probably gone up since I expect. 

He reckoned that the senior stewards were more interested in watching the ordinary stewards weren't watching the game.....

[Spoons]

What you have to remember is that the met police have a bigger force so have more officers , Avon and somerset are a tiny force in comparison and if they need 100 officers for a high profile game they are bought in from all over the county and sometimes from outside the force which only increases the cost.

 

[Chivs]

I think the main point here is that if the Met see these figures they will know they are not charging the going rate!

They are clearly not thinking in a business way and undercutting A&S Police by a large margin.

We should get a poster together for the Met plod "Customers not citizens" and display it at the Fulham games.

Or, perhaps the A&S Police should be held to account.  Anyone know how to do this?

[T R]

3 hours ago, Drew Peacock said:

I believe a few seasons ago Leeds Utd took the Yorkshire Police to court and had it established that policing costs outside the stadium should not be borne by the club.  Perhaps one of our legal experts can confirm this and confirm it is now case law.

I got halfway through it and gave up

https://cases.legal/en/act-uk2-21301.html

[Mr Popodopolous]

On 9/20/2016 at 18:07, 22A said:

The Police decide how much to charge per officer.

The Police decide how many officers are needed.

If the club disagrees with either figure, the Police withdraw the Safety Certificate and the game cannot go ahead.

 

Just returned to this thread.

 

Well it's their ball I guess and if they don;t like it they take it home so it's right obviously! Seems unfair and vastly inconsistent in charging practices however.

 

@Bar BS3 police are not supposed to charge for outside the stadium verbatim. Indeed, it can be argued our police- do they follow all guidelines at football as they should? College of Policing site and I quote says:

Quote

 

Engagement with supporters

The police service has an important role to play in the government’s strategy for tackling football disorder. This strategy is based on a multi-agency approach to reducing football-related disorder by:

• excluding risk supporters
• engaging with and including non-risk supporters
• influencing those supporters who are not currently understood to be a risk but who may, under specific circumstances, become involved in anti-social behaviour and/or spontaneous disorder.

A focus on community safety, as opposed to a purely risk-based approach to those engaging in violence or disorder at football, will create the opportunity to empower non-risk supporters and gather community intelligence.

Football officers can engage with supporters on match days, by attending supporter group meetings and through the use of social media (the latter should be undertaken in strict accordance with local force policies).

For further information see Public order APP (planning and deployment – communication – communicating directly with the public).

 

 

Now I am certainly not in the same part of the ground as them, but how well do they engage with the fans, the ordinary fans on a Matchday? From afar they look quite aloof to me, but this maybe a mistaken impression.

 

 

[Tin Soldier]

From what I heard,  the OB were queuing up for the Saturday football job at AG as they wanted a copy of Lumber's CSF book (:laugh:)!!!!