''Coppers'' is a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

fly-on-the-wall Fly on the wall is a style of documentary-making used in film and television production. The name derived from the idea that events are seen candidly, as a fly on a wall might see them. In the purest form of fly-on-the-wall documentary-making, ...

documentary television series broadcast on

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...

, about

policing in the United Kingdom Law enforcement in the United Kingdom is organised separately in each of the legal systems of the United Kingdom: England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. Most law enforcement duties are carried out by police constables of a terr ...

. First broadcast on 1 November 2010, the series followed the day-to-day lives of

police officer A police officer (also called policeman or policewoman, cop, officer or constable) is a Warrant (law), warranted law employee of a police, police force. In most countries, ''police officer'' is a generic term not specifying a particular rank. ...

s (colloquially known as 'coppers') from four

territorial police force A territorial police force is a police service that is responsible for an area defined by sub-national boundaries, distinguished from other police services which deal with the entire country or a type of crime. In countries organized as federation ...

s around the country, covering various activities:

custody suite {{Unreferenced, date=June 2011 A custody suite is an area within a police station in the United Kingdom designed and adapted to process and detain those who have been arrested, or who are there for purposes such as answering bail. Historically, ...

operations, road unit policing, 999 response, night time policing and

riot control Riot control is a form of public order policing used by law enforcement, military, paramilitary or security forces to social control, control, disperse, and arrest people who are involved in a riot, unlawful Demonstration (people), demonstration ...

. A second and final series began on 9 January 2012 and ran for 8 episodes.

Concept

The premise of the series was presented by the producers as follows: This referred to the impending cuts in

police The police are Law enforcement organization, a constituted body of Law enforcement officer, people empowered by a State (polity), state with the aim of Law enforcement, enforcing the law and protecting the Public order policing, public order ...

force budgets as a result of the

2010 Spending Review A spending review, or occasionally a comprehensive spending review, is a governmental process in the United Kingdom carried out by HM Treasury to set firm expenditure limits and, through public service agreements, define the key improvements that ...

, the results of which were announced in October 2010, just before the show aired. The series follows a reality television documentary style. Each episode features only a small amount of narration, and the majority of screen time is devoted to on location filming with interaction to camera from the police officers being filmed. This is supplemented with footage of officers talking to camera in a more formal setting, with minimal input by an interviewer. At the end of each episode, there is a summary of the outcome of the cases of many of the police officers and offenders featured.

Broadcast

The first series was broadcast as five one-hour episodes on

on Monday nights in the 9 pm timeslot. The second and final series was broadcast as eight one-hour episodes on Channel 4 on Monday nights in the 9 pm timeslot.

Episodes

Series 1

Series 2

External links