The Torygraph is venting its spleen about “political correctness gone mad” in Scotland’s police forces, following the publication of a new diversity handbook for officers.

What is this paper’s problem? The book seems to be full of useful advice like don’t handcuff people who can only communicate by sign language if you can avoid it and don’t use offensive terms like “deaf and dumb”. I was doing some training for clerks to appeal committees who were asking about where they could get information like this for their committee members.

Use of language is important and taking the time to make sure you are not being needlessly offensive would seem to me to be time well spent. It might even instill just a little bit of much needed public confidence in the police force.

Ridiculously, the article veers between objecting to being told what to say and not say; and asserting that it’s all so obvious that any police officer would know it all anyway! And, as usual, some rent-a-quote from the Taxpayers Alliance dives in to condemn the cost to the public purse.

And what was that cost? The astronomical sum of £4,500. For every police officer in Scotland? They should get a bloody award – that’s amazingly cheap (and probably less than it cost the Taxpayers Alliance to get their press release out).

Who reads this drivel?