Quality of UK police cars.

Hogzy

Just watching this manhunt for Raoul Moat on SkyNews and im flabbergasted by the quality of police cars they have in the UK. This is a county that is very rural yet the police are driving around in BMW X5's (brand new and one year old) brand new Land Rover Discoverys, brand new BMW 5series estates and new volvo's. And its EVERY car. Im currently looking at a scene with a 5series, Discovery and two X5's. WTF?

The police in the UK must have HUGE budgets. The cars the police seem to drive must be worth 2 or 3 times that of the officers personal cars. Its weird. For the cost of an X5 they could buy something less premium and afford to pay for another policemans salary.

Whats the point in such Premium cars?

shakin

Hogzy wrote: »

Just watching this manhunt for Raoul Moat on SkyNews and im flabbergasted by the quality of police cars they have in the UK. This is a county that is very rural yet the police are driving around in BMW X5's (brand new and one year old) brand new Land Rover Discoverys, brand new BMW 5series estates and new volvo's. And its EVERY car. Im currently looking at a scene with a 5series, Discovery and two X5's. WTF?

The police in the UK must have HUGE budgets. The cars the police seem to drive must be worth 2 or 3 times that of the officers personal cars. Its weird. For the cost of an X5 they could buy something less premium and afford to pay for another policemans salary.

Whats the point in such Premium cars?

im watching it myself and the cars on show are pretty impressive, however its probably because they are specialist firearms units and there may be a lot because they have got armed assistance from the neighbouring 5 counties

Hogzy

Yeah your prob right. Its really interesting to watch. Sick today so iv nothing better to do. Just a minute ago Kay Burley was talking at a check point and 2 Armed Response cars passed and all the armed police at the check point ran to their cars and flew after them. Seems as something new has happened. Seemed as if he has been sighted some where different.

POGAN

I am currently watching this too its crazy the standard of cars... they do look like there never used

mailforkev

I remember driving over to visit my aunt and uncle in England a few times with the family in the 80's and the motorway police back then all had XJ40 Jaguars and Range Rovers.

This was very cool to a car-mad child from grey 80's Dublin at the time.

Irish_polizei

Hogzy wrote: »

Whats the point in such Premium cars?

Reliability, safety, sports mode(i would imagine).....Like anything they have at this stage beats a couple of haztecs on a family saloon car over here!!

Delancey

I believe some UK forces customise their cars by yanking out the back seats and replacing them with hard durable plastic seats - stops prisoners hiding weapons , needles , drugs , etc down the back of ordinary seats.

CharlieCroker

AGS purchase their cars, British Police forces lease them. Thats the main difference.

UK police cars go out from the leasing company for 2 or 3 years and are then sent back.

So where AGS are paying e.g. €25000 for a mondeo that will be in service for 3 to 4 years approx, british police are prob paying stg£300-500 per month to lease an X5 or 5-series. so over the same 3 year period they're paying stg£11000 - 18000.

Also bare in mind, not all UK police vehicles are that exotic. The standard patrol car over there is a Focus/Astra diesel.

Spartan09

In my experience the 5series and x5's are not restricted to armed response units. My wife is from the uk and in the area she's from the majority of the patrol cars are bmw 5 series. The leasing idea sounds like a much more practical idea than buying considering that some of the garda saloon cars have 250k on the clock which is not good in terms of safety.

Delancey

250 K ? I would have thought that at perhaps 150 - 170 K those Garda cars would be retired and flogged off ?

Spartan09

delancey42 wrote: »

250 K ? I would have thought that at perhaps 150 - 170 K those Garda cars would be retired and flogged off ?

One of my in-laws is a Garda based in the country and both his squad car and van available to him have 200-250k on the clock....the van in particular is falling apart and if it breaks down they're in trouble, which it often does.

Delancey

Well to put a positive spin on it I suppose that they are running with that sort of mileage is a tribute to the maintenance programme in place , but they do sound pretty tired with all that on the clock.

cushtac

delancey42 wrote: »

250 K ? I would have thought that at perhaps 150 - 170 K those Garda cars would be retired and flogged off ?

No replacements until the current cars hit 300k either.

wicklaman83

the police forces are separated by individual forces.i.e greater manchester police force,north yorkshire police force,met police force etc and all forces have individual budgets but the gardai have a nation wide budget and thats the difference

Hogzy

darren254 wrote: »

the police forces are separated by individual forces.i.e greater manchester police force,north yorkshire police force,met police force etc and all forces have individual budgets but the gardai have a nation wide budget and thats the difference

How does that make a difference. Its just splitting up the money amongst different constabularies.

source

darren254 wrote: »

the police forces are separated by individual forces.i.e greater manchester police force,north yorkshire police force,met police force etc and all forces have individual budgets but the gardai have a nation wide budget and thats the difference

All the UK police forces are operated under the Home Office, this is where their budget comes from. So while yes there are a number of police forces in the UK they're all funded by centrally by the government.

Jumbo156

Is everyone not forgetting the price of cars in UK comapred to here. You could probably pick up a 5 series in the Uk for the price of a mondeo over here....

Rialtas

foinse wrote: »

All the UK police forces are operated under the Home Office, this is where their budget comes from. So while yes there are a number of police forces in the UK they're all funded by centrally by the government.

I'm not sure that's necessarily true. Each Home Office force corresponds to one or a group of local government areas and each force has a police authority which appoints the Chief Constable and oversees the strategic operation of that force. These authorities are comprised of local politicians and other stakeholders.

I would imagine some of the funding is raised locally given that British local government has far more extensive revenue generation powers.

With regards to the fleet procurement policies of various forces, I think they vary widely. For example, Humberside have one or two Lexus IS-F (400bhp+) motors in their Vehicle Crime Unit, but their standard beat cars are Protons running on LPG. Two extremes there, which could be argued has an effect on morale amongst PC's if the masses are driving buckets and an elite few are zooming around in gucci kit.

The Met on the other hand has (I think) three distinct types of patrol car, excluding Traffic etc. -
Pandas (Fiesta) for non-emergency work
IRV's (Astra) for general beat and response
Area Cars (3 Series) for high-priority response etc.

I think the Irish system is better overall. The specifications of the cars could be better but the UK system seems to be rigid and promote specialisation IMHO.

Hogzy

Jumbo156 wrote: »

Is everyone not forgetting the price of cars in UK comapred to here. You could probably pick up a 5 series in the Uk for the price of a mondeo over here....

You do realise they dont have to pay tax or vrt, they are the Gardai, a state dept.

cushtac

Hogzy wrote: »

You do realise they dont have to pay tax or vrt, they are the Gardai, a state dept.

The Gardaí actually do pay VRT on all vehicles bought.

Delancey

Just saw on Sky that the P.S.N.I. are shipping 20 armoured Mitsubishi Shoguns to help Northumbria Police in their manhunt - I never knew those Shoguns/Pajeros were armoured.

CharlieCroker

cushtac wrote: »

The Gardaí actually do pay VRT on all vehicles bought.

+1

Most people dont realise AGS pay VAT and VRT on all vehicles. Doesn't make any sense to me!!

shakin

CharlieCroker wrote: »

+1

Most people dont realise AGS pay VAT and VRT on all vehicles. Doesn't make any sense to me!!

that seems daft (irish), i thought the word exempt was written on tax discs on garda cars?

source

shakin wrote: »

that seems daft (irish), i thought the word exempt was written on tax discs on garda cars?

That's road tax, not VRT.....well to be exact it's a road fund licence. Vehicle Registration Tax is a tax paid at point of sale for registering the vehicle.

and yes it is daft, Dept of Finance gives Dept of Justice a budget, then Dept of Justice buys things and pays tax on it, giving a percentage back to the Dept of Finance......it's stupidity.

Delancey

I note that modern language or Political Correctness has crept into descriptions of Police vehicles. At a press conference today the Chief Constable of Northumbria was asked a question about the '' Armoured 4x4's supplied by the P.S.N.I. '' in her reply she twice referred to them as ''Ballistically Modified vehicles ''

meathstevie

Aye, that's the politically correct version of "a pig of a yoke to drive" I suppose

How do you ballistically modify a car or SUV anyway ? Launch it out of a huge slingshot ? I think the Chief Constable meant "a vehicle with enhanced protection against high velocity projectiles".

What's wrong with people nowadays. Can an armoured 4x4 not just be called an armoured 4x4 anymore ?

meathstevie

meathstevie wrote: »

Aye, that's the politically correct version of "a pig of a yoke to drive" I suppose

How do you ballistically modify a car or SUV anyway ? Launch it out of a huge slingshot ? I think the Chief Constable meant "a vehicle with enhanced protection against high velocity projectiles".

What's wrong with people nowadays. Can an armoured 4x4 not just be called an armoured 4x4 anymore ?

Maybe it's the 4x4 bit that causes offense, hence it being left out of the pc wording of it. You know how people are these days with 4x4's :rolleyes:

Good to see though tonight the PSNI's vehicles getting put to good use. Albeit as human shields for the officers up at the very front of the stand off, so not ideal, but atleast they're doing the job they were sent out there to do.

Terrontress

When that tragic vehicle fire occurred to the PSNI officers in Warrenpoint, a passing taxi driver attempted to gain access to the officers by breaking a window with his fire extinguisher to help them out. The armoured nature of the Shogun meant he couldn't get in. I also heard it rumoured from a local resident that the armoured nature of the vehicle contained the ammunition on board which went off due to the heat.

London Met Police are diversifying their standard patrol car due to the threat of GM going under last year which could have led to maintenance problems. All new standard patrol cars are either Vauxhall Astra, Ford Focus or Hyundai i30. But out and about, the two most commonly seen are Astras or BMW 5 Series. There are a lot of silver Merc Sprinter vans which look like ambulances as well.

PSNI have a tasty Range Rover with some form of floodlight system on the roof. I've also seen them in Golf R32, Focus ST and Lancer Evo. The standard seems to be either the Shogun or a Skoda Octavia

Tefral

Over in Scotland the Cops there had a brand new EVO 10