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I grew up learning to sign.
Basically, my parents and two sisters are deaf...
...and so I grew up with it as one of my first languages.
Since then, I've continued to learn and improve my signing.
It's not everyday that we deal with deaf people.
However, on occasions where I have had to...
...communicate with deaf people through work...
...it has helped a lot and deaf people are quite happy...
...that someone is there to communicate with them.
Especially a police officer...
...because a lot of the time they find it quite difficult.
Basically the best thing about being able to sign...
...is just being able to commmunicate with deaf people.
A lot of the time...
...in order to get a British Sign Language interpreter in...
...it's quite a long process.
It's very costly.
So to be able to help the police in communicating...
...within work time is quite good for them...
...and it makes us feel a bit better that they are getting the support...
...that they need.
I first got into signing...
...my wife is a speech and language therapy assistant.
She was doing an evening class...
...and I went along to keep her company.
I enjoyed it so much that I carried it on.
I was very fortunate the police decided to sponsor me...
...to carry on and I've now just completed my Level 3.
It helps me in my job.
I've surprisingly come across a few deaf people...
...on a day to day basis.
Either who are tourists or have come into the stations for enquiries.
It's really nice to be able to make some form of communication.
It surprises them, in a very nice way.
They're very pleased that we're making the effort to communicate with them.
We also have the Specialist Deployment department.
We're called in if the need arises if there's a deaf victim of crime...
...or witness to a crime.
We can assist them with statement taking and going through the process.
The best thing about it is enjoying the surprise I see...
...on their faces when they actually make the effort to communicate...
...with them and that we can actually have a conversation.
They're so pleased that the police are making the effort...
...to reach other members of the community
So I enjoy that part of it.
If you are deaf, hard of hearing or have difficulty communicating...
...why not register with EmergencySMS text service?
The emergency SMS service helps people in the UK...
...send a SMS message to the UK 999 service...
...where it will be passed to the police, ambulance, fire rescue or coastguard.
In an emergency, you can also call 999 or 18000 using a textphone.
To find out how to regsiter visit www.emergencysms.org.uk...
...or text 'register' to 999 and follow the instructions.