#MeetTheRep Pete Gartland is Deputy Chair of the City of London Police Federation

9 February 2026

Q: Can you tell us a little bit about your career history to date?

A: I joined Essex Police after I graduated from university, initially as a civilian whilst waiting to be with the regulars. Fortunately, I did get in first time, but there was such a recruitment drive at the time, back in 2004, that it took a little while to get through the entire process. Once I had joined, I spent 10 years in Essex before transferring to the City of London Police in 2015, where I’ve been for 11 years now.

Q: When did you decide to become a Federation Rep?

A: I'm a great believer in fairness and equity for people, and to make sure that people are looked after by the organisation. Policing is a really, really tough job and it has only got harder over the last 20 or so years. I've witnessed that with my own eyes. I felt that officers were, certainly in more recent years, perhaps not being given the support that I felt that they needed and were not being looked after by the organisation in the way that they should be. Being a Fed Rep has allowed me to nurture officers, to support officers, some in real dire times at points in their life, and to hold the organisation account when it needs to be held to account, which is to make sure that everybody's treated fairly in line with Police Regulations, everybody is happy to come to work and is looked after when they're at work.

Q: Could you tell us about what your role involves specifically?

A: As a Fed Rep or ‘workplace rep’, ultimately my role is to make sure that I support members and ensure that when they come to me with issues, that we address those issues in a timely fashion for the benefit of the member, and to make sure that they are looked after and treated appropriately. As the Deputy Chair, I will work primarily to support the membership and to make sure that the officers that are part of our Federation are treated appropriately, and I will support Russell Pengelly as the Chair and Suzanne Ferris as the Secretary in making sure that they continue to do that as well. It’s important that we present a united voice as a Federation, but I will always make sure my voice is heard within that team.

Q: If a member needs help from the Federation, what should they do?

A: Reach out to one of us. We're really, really visible in the City of London. We're quite a small force, we're all operational staff. We've got a good spread of workplace reps across the organisation, so the members have got access to somebody in each directorate, not necessarily in each department, but we're really accessible.

Q: Can you tell us an unusual fact about yourself?

A: I do a lot of clay pigeon shooting in my spare time and I've got two young girls who also keep me busy. I’m a very keen motorcyclist, and my friends and I travel far and wide. We make sure to have a couple of trips a away each year which I find very important for personal well-being.