POLICE officers – rightly so – are awarded some of the highest esteem of any profession.

They prove themselves worthy of this daily by putting their lives on the line, protecting the public and upholding principles over-and-above those expected of most in society.

Those officers, the vast majority, suffer when the actions of a few fall short of this standard and bring shame to the force as a whole by bringing it into disrepute.

Transparency, one of the The College of Policing’s four key values for serving, protects those officers.

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The value calls on the force and its members to be transparent in “our actions, decisions and communications”.

Why then, do the national guidelines mean police forces like ours in Sussex or the chairmen and women at the hearings keep data from the community they serve? We would ask he or she if we knew who they were. Or if the Police and Crime Commissioner told us.

They say this is to protect the privacy of the dismissed officers – “which even criminals enjoy by law”.

But, we argue, the public needs to know the details about who has been dismissed and what for.

This is so that we can trust the force to maintain its high standards.

What falls below the standard expected and what doesn’t when it comes to the people we pay for through our council tax?

Moreover, dismissals, and the reasons for them, are available for other people held in public trust including doctors, teachers, nurses and dentists.

On occasions, information may be redacted to protect the innocent.

However, seldom is the whole dismissal kept from the public in those public professions.

This is done as transparency helps to maintain public faith in the institutions they serve.

As well as this, as it does with courts and inquests, being open serves to provide scrutiny into the dismissal process itself. Are people being dismissed fairly? We simply do not know in all cases as things stand.

For these reasons, Sussex Police should be able to make all hearing results public. The national guidance should be changed.

Nationally, the barred list should be exactly that, a list of names and officers you can read through without having to guess names of those who may be on it, like we did with the name Baker.

They should do this to abide by its own value of transparency, uphold trust in its institution, provide scrutiny into the dismissal process and, arguably most importantly, protect the reputation of decent, hardworking officers who make up the vast majority of its force.