PC Mark Barr

I'm PC 125 Mark Barr.  I'm the Community Beat Manager covering the Grantham Rural North, Grantham Rural South and Grantham West area.

I initially joined as a PCSO and in July 2014 I became a police constable.

I'm now a CBM (Community Beat Manager) [which] I've been doing for just over two years.

It's been thoroughly enjoyable. There are moments when you see harrowing things and you see funny things, bizarre things but I've enjoyed every day of it.

The best part of the job is just the diversity of the job. You could be dealing with anything from a drugs warrant to a scam talk with the Women's Institute.

I often find myself dealing with incidents and I'll say to myself 'my wife isn't going to believe what I've just dealt with today.'

When I booked on duty at nine o'clock this morning my sergeant made me aware of an incident that had been called in last night where a member of the public had come across a package in the bushes and I was asked to attend and collect the package because it may have potentially been drugs. Whilst on route back to the station I've got another call to say that was some loose sheep in one of the villages nearby to the police station so I went out and helped one of my colleagues get the sheep back into the field and that was all in the space of 20 minutes - a drugs package ad herding sheep!

I'd say the challenging parts of the job are managing people's expectations. With my role as a CBM, people ask 'I want this to be done' or 'I don't want this to be done' and you have to be realistic with the general public and that can be challenging at times.

If I had a message for someone that wanted to join the police I would say 'join'. It's the best job in the world. It's challenging at times. No two days are the same. As I said, you could be doing anything between a drugs warrant a scam talk with the WI, but I would say join straightaway - best job in the world.