NPT is working with a team of public order managers and practitioners from police services around the UK to develop a new manual of good practice.

The guide is designed to advise and inform planners, advisers and commanders managing events and incidents where there is a possible risk to public safety, or potential for disorder.

Today’s environmental protest movements and greater general awareness of human rights are the backdrop to ‘direct action’. Policing public protest therefore calls for an increasingly sophisticated approach, often consulting and working with partner agencies and stakeholders representing the communities affected.

Inspector Geoff Wooloff, at Training Design, NPT Harrogate, is managing the manual project. He said: “The aim of the new guide is to take the policing of disorder back into mainstream police activity and to link it with crime reduction.

The focus is on prevention whilst retaining the ability and capacity to respond to disorder when needed. It incorporates modern policing methods such as the use of intelligence, threat and risk assessment and the role of the Senior Investigating Officer.”

The new manual replaces the old public order guide and has been given the working title of ‘The Manual of Guidance to Keeping the Peace’. All new legislation, procedure and practice are included in the new handbook which should be available in a variety of formats to police services in August.

Assistant Chief Constable Nigel Yeo from Sussex Police was the ACPO sponsor for the project. He said: “The old guide was written in the early 1990s and focused on set-piece urban disorder. It gave more tactical advice about how many riot shields should be used and how to position your officers. Much of that advice is now handled by the public order section of the National Operations Faculty.

“The modern police service has to manage environmental or animal rights protests and other such single issue political matters.”

The guide is in keeping with joined-up operations across the different policing areas, and the project team has worked closely with Her Majesty’s Inspectors of Constabularies and specialists in firearms, officer safety, traffic and human rights legislation.

Geoff Wooloff says: “Feedback indicates that the lighter style of the guide, with its bullet points and tips for action, make it a valuable and easily digested source of reference.”

The manual will be available on CD-ROM, A4 reference and an A6 ringbinder formats, which officers can take out on duty.