South West cops play Santa during Christmas time

South West District Police is using its second annual Christmas appeal to give back to the community they serve and help families doing it tough during the festive season.

South West youth policing officer First Class Constable Kabe Redfern said the appeal was a chance for officers to connect with the people they come across during the Christmas period.

“The appeal first started last year, it came about from an idea of wanting to do some more relationship-building exercises with the community,” he said.

“There were also a few families that police were dealing with regularly during the Christmas period.

We are often the face of taking someone away or taking something away and we would like to offer something to give.

Const. Redfern said donations were being processed from a range of police stations around the region, with Bunbury already having received a significant number of gifts.

Last year, more than 200 gifts were given to officers to distribute around the region.

“When an officer is rostered on, they are allocated a Santa sack of sorts with gifts that are marked for all different age ranges,” Const. Redfern said.

“If they come across an incident involving young people, they deal with it first in a policing sense by doing whatever is required, but additionally they have those gifts that might just help them to spread a little bit of joy as well.”

Presents can be donated to any of the police stations in the South West district.