Poll Should UK Police Be Armed?

[Hux]

After the events of the Westminster attack, and the death of a police officer, there are some who are bringing this up again.

It should be noted that the terrorist was shot by Michael Fallon's (defence secretary) security who happened to be there. Whether the police officer being armed would have saved his life or not is unknown as he may have been stabbed suddenly without warning (a gun wouldn't have helped him... and may have made things worse if the terrorist had taken his gun).

Anyway, what do you think?

I say no. I like walking down the street knowing the police can't shoot me because their wife just cheated on them. An armed response unit is adequate.

 

[TheSowIsMine]

I agree with you. I think the english police as they are now are fine and for serious things, have an armed unit at the ready.

In the Netherlands the police carries guns, but they aren't trigger happy. Sometimes they kill their spouse with their service weapon because they cheated, but that is incidental.

 

[Carol]

There are more armed police in Britain than ever before, so I think the balance is about right. Still freaks me out to see police with guns though. hope it worries the bad guys even more!

 

[DeJoHnNiE]

I agree with you. I think the english police as they are now are fine and for serious things, have an armed unit at the ready.

In the Netherlands the police carries guns, but they aren't trigger happy. Sometimes they kill their spouse with their service weapon because they cheated, but that is incidental.

We are less prone to pull a gun and much less triggerhappy than the countries that allow guns or are much faster to grab it or have a higher criminal rate that carries guns themselfs.

I like the way UK solved it with having armed response teams and that regular police is much more careful in violent or possible weapon situations as they do not carry a gun and have to wait until the ART arrives to deal with it accordingly. But again, in UK and the Netherlands we don't have so many weapons in general that it's only used when there is no other choice or when your or someone else their life is in danger.

I have had discussions with people about how police open carries their guns and some believe that they are fast enough to grab a gun from police, but they do not realize that all police is trained very hard on that specific part and will not happen. Believe that many have tried and always failed