Stop and search response

Today Conservative Party leader, David Cameron, urged the Prime Minister to scrap the "foot-long" form officers must fill in when they stop someone - which he said was "a colossal waste of police time". Home Secretary Jacqui Smith is expected to announce in the next few days that more police officers will be given the power to search people without giving a reason. This all comes ahead of the planned publication of the Flanagan report next Monday.
 
We have issued the following statement to the media:
 
Jan Berry, Chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales, says:
 
“Any moves to cut bureaucracy, restore the discretion police officers can exercise and inject some ‘common sense’ back into policing is to be welcomed.
 
“Police officers should be accountable for actions they take, and these forms are as much about protecting officers as they are about protecting the public. But officers should be allowed discretion as to when to record stop and encounters. Recording stop and search is different though, as it involves contact with people and is a statutory requirement, but common sense and discretion should prevail as to how much detail is required to be recorded.”