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The Times - No training? And for that a little boy had to die? James Campbell: Thunderer

Which leaves us with the matter of training. No one doubts that training is important. It teaches the individual to keep his head when all about him panic. That is why we so often hear soldiers or police who have performed feats of heroism say “my training took over”. This was illustrated recently in the car-bomb attack on Glasgow airport. How many of us would have legged it? Not John Smeaton and other passers-by. Their training as Glaswegians took over. Within minutes they had applied “the banjo” and the man was on the ground being kicked so vigorously that one man sprained his foot.

The argument that one is acting responsibly by refusing to do something for which one has not been trained is not merely a new and sinister addition to the armoury of a jobsworth but, worse, suggests the view that human beings are no more useful than a computer that does not have the correct software installed.

Unfortunately for poor Jordan Lyon, PCSOs have been well trained to overcome the natural human instinct to save a drowning child. Trained not to attempt something for which they had not been trained.

And there you have it.