YP Letters: Arming police could misfire in so many ways

IN response to David Collins (The Yorkshire Post, April 4) regarding all police officers being armed, I doubt all officers would wish to be armed.

Having been an armed officer myself, those who carry firearms are selected carefully and I doubt, certainly in the present day, that many officers would meet those requirements. That is not intended to insult but it is a fact. Furthermore, even if they were, it is doubtful all would wish to carry firearms.

Thankfully the UK does not have the same gun culture as some countries and, whilst there are increasing incidents, there are many armed officers on daily patrol ready to deal with them.

As for the possibility of a future debate on the subject of all officers being armed, then such a debate will probably be a long time in the waiting. If there were such a debate, the likely outcome would be negative. That said, if the outcome was positive, there would be a significant egress of officers by way of resignations or retirements.

That in itself could create mayhem by depleting forces of the valuable experience required to maintain policing levels. Such a move would most certainly take a significant amount of a time to replace and stretch financial resources even further than imaginable.