Greater Manchester Chief Constable Stephen Watson as that arrests for “tasty language” are “guff” and not for coppers.
Watson said that forces should investigate all reports of crime but quickly tell people reporting “fluff and nonsense” to “grow up”.
He told Times Radio: “If we are seen to be pontificating on social media issues, we lose the public.”
He also was critical of police getting caught up in issues of “critical race theory and gender identity … inflamed by social and political activists”.
Speaking at the Times Crime and Justice summit commenting on the incident last month which saw six officers from Hertfordshire police arrested two parents in Borehamwood who complained about their daughter’s primary school on WhatsApp he said .
I, like the rest of the public, I’ll see an image of half a dozen officers turned up to what is apparently a perfectly innocuous thing. It might be that people have used tasty language online but it’s not unlawful and it’s not actually for the police to involve themselves. So, of course, one is concerned.”
