The Ukip candidate hoping to be elected as Northamptonshire’s first police commissioner has vowed to arm more response police officers with Tasers, if elected.
Jim MacArthur, a former SAS soldier, said he was concerned about the safety of officers patrolling the county on their own and has promised to arm “single” response officers with one of the controversial devices.
He said: “Single officers are often routinely required to man such vehicles on their own. Clearly this poses an additional risk to the officers concerned, particularly whenever they are called to deal with a potentially violent situation.
“I have already pledged to request the chief constable ensures that ‘evidence gathering’ video recorders are issued to all officers who are ‘single manned’ when patrolling in immediate response vehicles.
“Being concerned with officer safety, particularly in the light of recent events, I have given this problem more thought and decided to support the view that all such patrol vehicles should also carry a Taser device with them.
“This will give further protection to officers, especially when they are single manned. I pledge therefore to ensure sufficient finance is available for officer training in their use and to purchase any additional devices required.
“I appreciate some members of the public may have concerns about my proposal, mainly due I think to the unfortunate and misleading description of the device as a ‘gun’.
“However, in spite of such understandable apprehension, it is officer safety that is in the forefront of my mind.”
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