Hello again欢迎来到Happy Hour英文小酒馆。关注公众号璐璐的英文小酒馆，加入我们的酒馆社群，邂逅更精彩更广阔的世界。

Hi everyone and welcome back to Britain Under the Microscope.欢迎回来《闲话英伦》. Hello 安澜。

Hello Lulu, hi everyone.

What are we going to talk about today?

Well, I know how much you like a nice good crime drama.

Oh, yes.

So I thought today we could talk a little bit about the police in the UK.

That's a great idea. I've already done the same topic with James before about America. Where can we start? I really don't know where to start, maybe we start with Scotland Yard?

Oh, yeah, let's start with the beginning. The first century control police force was actually based is Scotland Yard. It was the metropolitan police.

I always had this question, and I think many of our listeners had the same question when you are reading about Sherlock Holmes or any other English crime drama you will hear苏格兰场 Scotland Yard. Why is it called Scotland Yard even though it is in London?

That's because their headquarters when they were founded in1829 was very close to the House of Parliament in a place called Scotland Yard, and it was called Scotland Yard because in medieval times that was where ambassadors from Scotland used to live.

Oh, so actually was like the old site for the Scottish ambassadors back in the days.

Yeah, it was like the Scottish embassy type thing.

I see, another question is you said the first centrally controlled police force was founded in1829, was that like the one of the oldest in the world?

It is pretty much one of the oldest, yes, there was a type of police force in the past, but they weren't very well developed. And because it was one of the first, that's why in many countries around the world, it's very similar to the UK because the UK was seen as a model.

And what is your police force called? 就是比如说什么伦敦警察局什么的，how do you call that London police force?

We would call…well, there’s actually a few police forces, there's a City of London police force.

A City of London就是金融城的financial part.

Um, and then there's the metropolitan police or the Met.

The metropolitan police, which is in charge of what? the whole Greater London area?

Pretty much the whole of Greater London, except for the City of London, and also transport and river as well, they have their own separate police forces.

That is so complicated.

Yeah, it is, a little bit, they're separate but they do work very closely together.

So let's say if I want to report a crime, I go to the Met.

Yeah.

In London I go to the Met?

Well, you'll just call 999.

And then automatically… I see. 999 that's what you call for the police.

Yeah, and also fire and ambulance.

Oh, all in one number. Another very interesting thing I watch a lot of British shows, sometimes you hear people say Bobby, 英式俚语里面管警察有时候叫Bobby, that's a person's name.

Yep, that's because the metropolitan police was founded by a man called Sir Robert Peel.

Oh, Robert Bob, Bobbies.

Yeah, and in the Victorian age they used to be called peelers, so Bobby is for Robert, peeler for Peel.

It's a way for them to honor the founder, I guess.

It was a type of slang.

Now let's come to the uniforms, you know I'm a huge fan of uniforms. I always remember when I was for example in Italy, I thought some of their uniforms look great, but not so much in the UK the police uniforms they are not stylish, are they?

Not really, no, they were originally designed as a bit of a mixture because what they wanted to do was they wanted to make them seem approachable, but also authoritative.

Approachable means that they look friendly enough, you can just go up and talk to them and enquire things

Yeah, so the original uniform was a little bit of a bland looking like a gentleman, but also looking like a servant.

我脑子里面现在就觉得是想到片警的感觉，so they are approachable. But there also are a lot of the times wearing these very bright colored, I don't know, it's almost like they're let's say working in construction.

Oh, yeah, they are the police so they need to be visible.

Oh, that is to make sure that they stand out.

Oh, yeah, or they normally wear black, you know they have bullet proof or stab proof vests. Some of our listeners probably think about the helmets which unfortunately they don't wear anymore.

Yeah, I don't remember seeing them.

They only wear them on special occasions, it’s a dress uniform.

So now it's more like a ceremonial; and they don't really carry guns, right, the UK Police Force?

No, 90% of police in the UK don't carry guns.

Do they carry anything to…I mean, they have to catch the criminals, right, if they are not armed at all.

They would have batons.

Baton is a big stick.

Yeah.

Heavy thing, yeah.

But they would also sometimes use stun guns as well.

Stun gun is using the shock to… like a taser.

But it's quite controversial, because the whole idea of the police in the UK it should be police by consent, that's something that you hear quite a lot.

Police by consent, consent means saying yes.

Yes, not police by force.

So again it goes into the whole idea the police should be approachable that they are there to serve the public.

I understand they serve the public, but they don't serve the criminals, right?

Oh, no.

That's a very interesting idea I've never heard of this, police by consent basically means you are nice, in general, that you don't want to force people but police by force is more I guess more the American style with guns like freeze that sort of situation.

That's not to say that police in the UK don't carry guns, but the only places you'll see police carrying guns are like airports or locations where there's a risk of terrorist attack.

Oh, I see, but there are different types of police, right? The normal police they are probably dealing with more I would say generic every day may be petty crimes.

Yeah

But there are different types of police officers, right? What about those people who investigate…let's say murders.

You have the CID so…

What’s CID?

Criminal Investigation Department.

Criminal Investigation Department, so they are detectives.

Yeah, they are detectives, there's also special branch as well which deal with quite sensitive cases. There's lots of different types of police in the UK, it can get a little bit complicated.

Yeah, it does sound very complex, but we're not going to get into details of that.

No, but what I thought might be interesting to have a chat about is all the different types of slang around police, and also some of the words that you may hear when watching British crime dramas for example the word Nick.

Nick, N-I-C-K

Yep, it's a verb or a noun; and it's generally used around crimes. For example, you are nicked means you're arrested.

You’re arrested. I think I've heard of that in some of the crime dramas, but also in some soap operas.

Yeah, also to be down at the nick means to be at the police station.

But I thought to nick something actually means to steal something?

Yeah

Such a versatile word.

Oh, yeah, that's it. If you ever hear that word is normally related to crime, you can also say to be in the nick which means to be in prison.

I'm not sure if I can remember all of that, earlier on we talked about Bobbies.

Yeah.

Do you have any other slang words to call the police?

Oh, yeah, I’ll focus on the polite ones, that we have the Old Bill.

The Old Bill.

Oh, that's just another way of saying the police, it's a little bit old fashioned now but you do sometimes still hear it, the word cops or coppers.

I always thought cop is American English.

But we do say in the UK as well.

Copper I've heard.

Yeah, probably copper is more British rather than cops, but we still say the expression it's a fair cop, when you admitted that you've done something wrong, you might say it's a fair cop.

I remember ages ago, I was watching a comedy that's… when I watched it, it's already very very old, comedy by Rowan Atkinson, Mr. Bean called the Thin Blue Line where I think he was like a constable, does that have anything to do with the police?

Yeah, he was a chief constable or inspector because I remember that's from the 90s, you can still find it around it's a good show. The Thin Blue Line is the idea that the police are there to stop society from breaking apart, so they are the thin blue line of defense.

Blue means the police force?

Yeah.

I see.

They do wear black, but the color blue is associated with the police.

One more question is if you actually do need to approach the police on the street, for example, how do you call them? You don't know their names you can't just say警察叔叔you can just say good morning officer.

Yeah, you would say an officer or constable, but in London sometimes you just call the mate.

Yeah, I'm not going to try that.

But that's the whole thing it's about… and they have to be approachable and they are to help the public. So British people generally would go up and speak to the police.

I've never tried hopefully I wouldn't need that.

Yeah, most of it is around community support so the idea of a policeman on their beat.

All right, we've definitely learned a bit about the police force in the UK especially in London. If you have any other questions to ask, or anything to add, leave us a comment in the comment section. Thank you安澜 for coming to the studio.

Thanks a lot Lulu.

See you next time.

Bye.

Bye.