Jemma Walton meets some of the city's Pcs:

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Video: Training with the police
Jemma Walton went along to a police training session, and was arrested twice in the process.
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Tina and Laura aren't stereotypical burly bobbies

Laura Vessey and Tina Laughton prove that there are a lot of young women making their way in the police.

Stereotypes that police officers have to be big, burly blokes are just plain wrong (no matter what Gene Hunt from Life on Mars might say).

"I don't see myself as any different from any other police officer in training," said Laura (23), from March. "And no one has treated me any differently so far. I know I'm young, but I have a mature head on young shoulders, so I have no worries about any of that, really.

"I decided to try to be a police officer after working as a special for two years and working in the police call centre, dealing with 999 calls and dispatching police officers on jobs. I knew what being a Pc involved, and I know it's for me.

"I started off my career in sales, but I found that boring. I wanted a job that had a lot of variety, and so I joined the specials to see what being in the police was like.

"We did everything, 10-hour shifts, and we'd react to 999 calls.

"My family are very proud of me becoming a full police officer. My dad was a special for 15 years"

Tina (32), from Stamford, has been a PCSO covering Welland, Dogsthorpe and New England for nearly two years, and before that worked as a PA to the owner of a stately home in Rutland.

"Being in the police is quite different from that! she said.

"I wanted to join the police because, and I know this sounds like a cliché, I wanted to make a difference. And it's exciting and interesting – you're paid to be nosey, really.

"I'm not afraid of being in difficult situations, because most police officers would tell you, if you have a good attitude towards people, they will have a good attitude towards you.

"And being a woman Pc can be really helpful because some times big blokes will be really irate and agree to speak to a woman but want to have nothing to do with a male officer.

"When you're in the police no two days are ever the same, and when you get to work in the morning you could be sent out to deal with anything. There aren't many jobs where you can say that – there aren't many jobs as interesting as this one."

Petr Torak

Petr Torak will be a familiar face to many ET readers – he has been doing a great job of liaising between Peterborough police and foreign people while working as a PCSO, mainly in Millfield.

He enjoyed being a PCSO so much that he decided to train as a police officer.

Petr is a Roma gypsy, and comes from the Czech Republic. But there is a streak of Roma-hatred running through his home country, and he and his family were forced to leave their home country in 1999 after a racist attack, and are refugees in the UK.

"I signed up to be a PCSO as my family and I have had so much help from the English Government and I wanted to give them something back, he said.

"I was a PCSO for 17 months, and soon realised that I wanted a career in the police. I have really enjoyed the training, but it can be very hard having to know so much law – you have to know more or less every- thing!"

Petr (27) is fluent in English, Czech, Slovakian, Polish and Portuguese, and is learning Roma and Russian, and so should be extremely well-equipped to deal with the majority of situations police are called to deal with in Peterborough.

Julie Gray-Esson

Julie Gray-Esson is 45, and has enjoyed a wide range of jobs, including stints in security at Whitehall Prison and as a judo instructor.

She is also mum to two boys aged five and seven, and stayed at home with them for five years

"I did several part- time jobs during those five years," she said.

"And when I went back to work full-time I promised myself that I would do something that I really wanted to do.

"When you have a family, the community means much more to you – you really do want the streets to be safe, and you do want the world to be as good a place as possible for your children.

And so I signed up to be a PCSO."

Julie, from Chatteris, is a good example of the kind of person the police need. As a mum in her 40s, she brings a wide range of life experience to the job that will be invaluable when she's out on the streets.

She was a PCSO for 18 months, and decided to apply to be a full police officer as she was frustrated at not being able to arrest people, and having to step back in certain situations to let a warranted officer take charge.

"My husband was worried when I said I wanted to join because of the safety thing, but also because police officers have to be able

"The hardest day fo me was actually the day I found out my application to the force had been accepted.

"I was working as a PCSO, and was working with a Pc, and we were called to a car crash. A seven-year- old girl was trapped underwater in a car, and we had to try and get her out.

"We couldn't. I remember going home and feeling horrible, but then getting home and seeing my two boys and being so grateful for what I had

"I went into a room and had a blubber, and dealt with it. I knew then that I could handle life as a Pc as things couldn't get much worse than that."