Calls for new award for fallen officers

7 April 2022

Suffolk Police Federation chair Darren Harris is welcoming calls for the creation of a new posthumous award for emergency service workers who lose their lives in the line of duty. 

Darren said it was time to overhaul the existing honours and awards system to make sure it adequately reflects the dedication, commitment and sacrifice of those who die in service. 

The new award would be similar to the Elizabeth Cross awarded to the bereaved relatives of members of the British armed forces killed in action.

Calls for it to be established are being led by the Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW), the Police Superintendents’ Association and the Prison Officers’ Association. They are seeking Home Office approval and cross-party support.

Darren explained: “As a branch, we are fully supportive of this new award being created. Police officers sign up to policing knowing that they are going to face dangerous situations while serving and protecting their communities.

“They run towards danger while others are running away and sadly some lose their lives while carrying out their duties. When that happens, I think it would be fitting for them to be honoured with an award similar to the Elizabeth Cross and I hope that this will soon be the case.”

PFEW national deputy secretary John Partington said: “It is only right we should honour fallen colleagues and support bereaved families. Police officers and other emergency service workers willingly run towards danger while others run away.

“The current awards system does not formally recognise emergency service workers who lose their lives while performing their duties, and all too often formal state recognition is not forthcoming.

“The proposed new medal would not just recognise outstanding individual acts of dedication to duty, it would also mean so much to family, friends and colleagues.”

The campaign has also been endorsed by the father of PC Nicola Hughes (23) who was murdered alongside her Greater Manchester Police colleague Fiona Bone in a gun and grenade attack by fugitive Dale Cregan in September 2012. 

“Police officers and emergency service workers like Nicola are human beings who go to work expecting to finish their shift then head home to see family. They willingly sign up to serve the public, knowing the dangers they might face. In my daughter Nicola’s case she was the tiniest thing, just 5ft tall. When she died, a colleague told me: ‘She had the body of a lion cub, and the heart of a lion’,” said Bryn Hughes.

“As a society, it is only fitting and right we recognise her service and courage. I am backing this campaign as the creation of a new medal would fittingly honour fallen colleagues, and the families of emergency workers who have suffered a devastating loss.

“It would mean so much to so many for the Government to officially show formal gratitude to Nicola and others and say ‘thank you’ to those who are killed because they have gone to work wearing a uniform.

“Although it is now a decade since we lost her, there is not a day that goes by where I don’t think of Nicola. Nothing will ever make up for her loss, but this award would bring a large degree of comfort to me and many others and is long overdue.”

Former prison officer Bryn played a leading part in the successful campaign to establish the UK Police Memorial at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire, which commemorates the 5,000 police officers who have died in the line of duty over the years. He also runs the PC Nicola Hughes Memorial Fund to help children whose parents have been murdered.

Nicola and Fiona were the posthumous recipients of the first ever Women in Policing Award when it was launched by the PFEW in 2015.