A Cornwall police badge?

An interesting idea has been mooted on a Cornish forum for officers of the Devon and Cornwall police force to wear police badges that state ‘Cornwall’ on them.

However, there is no reason why the words Kernow should not be added too. As will be seen on the Celtic League pages (CPW recommend doing a search)a campaign has been running by the League asking police constabularies in the Celtic countries, what their linguistic and cultural commitment is to the respective Celtic countries they serve. As will seen from the League’s news items here, Chief Constable Stephen Otter has already been sent several letters by the League on his constabularies commitment to the Cornish language and culture.

Other replies by various chief police officers from the different constabularies in the Celtic countries, found on the site, have been largely positive, but no reply from Otter has been shown. Either he has ignored the League’s questions or his response was so dismissive and short that the League didn’t think it worthy of posting up on their site.

For those readers who are interested, Cornwall did have its own police badge until the Cornwall County Constabulary was discontinued in 1967. Many of Cornwall’s police officers who worked through the change, stubbornly and rightly continued to wear their Cornwall police badge with pride for many years after, even though another (Devon and Cornwall) badge had been issued.

Also of interest is the fact that Cornwall (with the exception of Breizh/Brittany) is unique of the Celtic countries in that it is serviced by a police force that is based outside its territorial boundaries.

Both the above issues should be remedied and it is hoped that the League (and others) will take it upon themselves to campaign for these particular issues of concern some time soon.

The Cornwall 24 forum provides some interesting material for those interested in Cornish issues and occasionally discusses issues related to police activity. CPW however, cannot find the link to the Cornwall police badge discussion and would appreciate it if a reader could provide one in the comments section.