Female police officers yesterday revealed the sexist abuse they get from their colleagues, telling a national conference that misogyny exists in “every force” in the UK.
According to a survey, angry male coworkers tease women about promotions, implying that they got ahead only because they ‘had t**s.’
In stations across the country, the Police Federation of England and Wales convention heard examples of sexist behavior and crass remarks.
Two police community support workers were videotaped browsing through photos of women in detention, grading their appearances, and stating things like, “I’d sleep with her, but not her.”
The examples, reported anonymously, also included a learner detective being asked by a colleague if she had performed a sex act on a Crown Prosecution Service lawyer to persuade him to press charges in the case she was investigating.
Another female officer who had moved to a new role said: ‘I heard a colleague say, “I didn’t get it because I don’t have t**s”, knowing that I had got the job. I was standing next to him at the time with other people.’
The conference heard phrases such as ‘man up’, ‘you run like a girl’ and references to ‘wearing the trousers’ were also commonly used by officers.
One female sergeant recalled how a misogynistic male officer who left the force to escape a gross misconduct hearing received sympathy from colleagues.
‘They were saying, “oh, he was so close to retirement, he could have had his pension and gone in a couple of years”. The empathy seemed to immediately be on the offender and it was predominantly coming from male colleagues.’
Zoe Wakefield, a member of the Police Federation’s national women’s group, said misogyny was widespread: ‘If anybody says “it doesn’t happen in my force” you’re wrong, because it does happen in every single force.’
The revelations come after a succession of high-profile cases thrust police behaviour towards women into the spotlight.
Sarah Everard was murdered by Met officer Wayne Couzens and officers at Charing Cross police station were caught swapping jokes about raping women and killing black children.
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