The second of my recent purchases is a clipping from Modern
Transport Magazine from January 1949.
The article describes the new Railway Police School at Walton on the
Hill, Tadworth, Surrey. It expresses a
hope that the opening of the school would bring a consistency to the training
of officers from the various railway police forces which had come together as a
result of the nationalisation of public transport. The new force didn’t really have a name
(sometimes described as the British Railways Police) at this stage and it took
the passage of the British Transport Commission Act later in the year for the
BTC Police to emerge in a form that we would still recognise.
The article contains some photographs and a description of
the tasks facing the railway police in the post war period. It points out that it was the second largest
force in the country with around 4,000 officers.
‘Tadworth’ as it was universally known became the jewel in
the rather tatty regalia that was BTP’s estate.
A smart building with accommodation for 31 officers (with immediate plans
to expand to 60) it provided good facilities including a mock court and well
equipped classrooms. The billiard table
that was installed in 1948 was still there half a century later.
The idea of a single training school had been around for a
decade and was much discussed by the police chiefs of the big four railway
forces. One of those chiefs assumed that
he would become the first Commandant but the rest decided that a ex Met officer
from Hendon should be responsible for getting the establishment going. It was a success and it served an important role
for a national force. Officers from
railways and docks all over the country (including Scotland) attended courses
there and it became an important element in establishing a sense of
identity for BTP. The standard of the training
and the facilities were high. It was a
place that BTP officers could be proud of.
Prior to the purchase of Tadworth each force had trained their
officers differently. Like county and
borough forces a large part of this training was ‘on the job’. Some railway forces had used the training
facilities set up by local forces including the Metropolitan Police school at
Hendon. By the 1960s police training had
moved on. Recruit training was focused
on regional centres with ‘local procedures’ being taught in force. It was a logical development for BTP to buy
in, (literally), to this system with new recruits attending regional Home
Office training schools and being trained in specialist transport matters at
Tadworth. Tadworth continued to offer a wide range of
developmental and specialist training.
BTP adopted a training strategy that was based on the principle that BTP
officers should receive the same training as colleagues in other forces with
BTP specific training being added on at the end. For example BTP detectives would attend training
at places such as Wakefield or Hendon and then receive inputs into specialist
railway crimes (mailbag thefts, theft in transit etc) at Tadworth. More recently BTP has moved away from
training recruits to national standards (in England and Wales) meaning that
many forces will not now recognise BTP officers as qualified if they
transfer. I am sure that there is a
reason behind this strategy which will have been developed with longer term
issues in mind.
Tadworth served as a focal point for the force, despite
being rather awkwardly placed geographically, well into this century. It was originally purchased by the Southern
Railway and was then owned by the British Transport Commission and inherited by
the British Railways Board. Privatisation
was a nightmare for BTP and the title to Tadworth passed to the short lived Strategic
Rail Authority who saw it as an asset rather than something to be held for the
benefit of the force. It was not
transferred to the British Transport Police Authority. It, like half of England it seems, has been
converted into flats. The British
Transport Police History Group (BTPHG) has ensured that there is a plaque on
site reminding residents and visitors of its former use. I served for 2 years as an instructor/trainer at
Tadworth and what a privilege it was (1). I expect that this is also the
experience of current trainers at the modern force training facility in North
London.
The Modern Transport article reported that at the training
school “every endeavour will be made to
broaden the outlook of the students” .
Police training has never been just about procedures, practices and the
law. It has always had an element of
education as an essential component.
The BTPHG website contains articles about and photographs of
Tadworth and I commend the site to the attention of interested persons.
The cutting itself will be lodged with the BTPHG collection.
Philip Trendall
May 2024
(1)
At the
time it was necessary for BTP Instructors/Trainers to have completed the 13
week course at Pannal Ash (Harrogate) for student trainers AND an in house
course at Tadworth which lasted for 6 weeks.
It is worth noting that Tadworth also functioned as a de facto reserve
for the force with officers being mobilised to major incidents straight from
courses. The best examples were the
numerous deployments in the aftermath of the attacks in July 2005. Earlier, during
my short secondment I attended numerous bomb scenes and at least two train crashes
(one conveniently located at Tattenham Corner station a couple of miles from
the school.
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