Crew from the island’s police force recently travelled to Manchester for public safety events and incident training.

The public order/safety team, which is there as one of the forces options available to keep residents safe, were put through extreme training.

They’re trained at a high level to use tactics to assist the force in a wide range of events and incidents, from low-level safety concerns to violent persons and street disorder.

It caters for dealing with crowds, persons who require containing; whether they are vulnerable through disability or mental health, through to extremely violent people, who are intent on hurting others.

Some of the tactics that the team are trained in are actually national tactics, which they have to train in, so that the island’s police can assist UK forces should they require it, as we could be called to assist these forces through mutual aid.

The training is said to be extremely physically and mentally demanding, but as a public order officer, Sergeant Bartley and the team feel incredibly proud to serve the island community and keep them safe.

Sgt Barley said: ‘The team worked incredibly hard, and endured long hours, and as their supervisor, I was extremely happy at how they performed.

‘Since returning from Manchester, where we have to train due to training resources, we have put some of the training to practice, which has been incredibly successful.

‘The pictures that were taken clearly show the officers in what is more commonly referred to as riot gear, but it is far from it. The uniform is actually safety equipment. It is designed to keep the officer, and more importantly the public safe, from a number of incidents.

‘We train for every eventuality, which does include mass disorder, in the hope we never use it, but we also train in low-level safety tactics, like crowd safety and protest safety.’