South Yorkshire Chief Constable Stephen Watson

Last night after a church service in Tick Hill I spoke to the Chief Constable regarding policing of football matches in South Yorkshire in particular Oakwell. I did not know that he was going to be there and so I was not prepared with my questions as I would have liked nor as eloquent in speech as I would have liked!
I asked him why Oakwell with a 23000 capacity and with 3 stands built to the recommendations of Lord Justice Taylor has its capacity cut in particular only allowing 4500 tickets to be sold to SWFC but allowing Wolves 5000 tickets? and why when watching other grounds around the country on television, testimony on sites like this from travelling supporters do other grounds have short spaces between fans example being the Manchester derby where it appeared that only a line of stewards separated the two sets of fans? I told him of the poster on this site who had met BFC's safety officer and how he spoke of "sterile areas" in separating fans and I asked why large areas of seating was covered in netting. I made the statement that this was having an effect on the financial viability of the football club.
In reply he did say that he would feed back to his officers my concerns and they could be looked at again he also said that " you have to look at the history of policing at football matches in South Yorkshire" to which I said Hillsborough and he nodded and said yes. I told him of how many times this season I have walked to Oakwell from the town talking with Fulham, Bolton, Cardiff fans and that it is a tiny minority that spoils it for the rest which he agreed with. The general chat lasted about 5 minutes and I thanked him for stopping and talking to a mere Barnsley Supporter to which he said" don't say that my operations officer is always going on about Barnsley!"
From my conversation with the Chief Constable it once again highlighted that the Hillsborough disaster still has a big influence on how they police football matches in this area. A couple of years ago a retired police officer who was a matchday commander at Ellend Road said to me that Hillsborough and the associated politics with that disaster had a bearing over South Yorkshire Police and their policing of football matches.
As I stated at the start of this thread I was not prepared in advance to speak to the Chief Constable but I felt at the time I had to cease the opportunity and as the Tesco advert used to state " Every little Helps!"

 

Ironically, the fans at Hillsboro are significantly closer together than both sets of fans at Barnsley. Also, the games at Hillsboro are more likely to be at 3 o’clock than at oakwell

 

Good effort though, taking the time to push the points forward