Driving home from holiday on a French motorway last week, we were passed by a convoy of gendarmes. Nine or 10 large blue vans, lights flashing, hurried past at high speed. I never did find out where they were going or what they were doing, but I was quite keen to get out of their way. La Gendarmerie Nationale has a reputation for ferocity, as you might expect from a unit of the armed forces.
The sight of the convoy was a timely reminder that the French state, with a population almost identical to that of Britain, has vastly more police and public-order resources available than our own authorities. The gendarmes number almost 100,000 officers, while the National Police employs another 145,000, although that figure includes civilian and support workers. With local municipal forces, the total rises to around 250,000. In comparison, the British figure, including the Police Service of Northern Ireland, is around 170,000.
