Student police officers took over the Wiltshire Police Twitter account as part of the 12 Christmas Tweeters – a social media campaign to highlight the work that goes on behind the scenes at the county’s force.

Officers and staff from a variety of departments, including the dog section, press office, community policing teams and armed response, have been involved in the campaign, which finished at the weekend.

They had the opportunity to show the public behind the scenes of their training, which included a lesson on offensive weapons, searching for stolen items and a look ahead to personal safety training.

PC Dan England, who took control of Twitter on behalf of his fellow students for the day, said: “I have previously worked in the control room and within corporate communications and I know that we regularly receive enquiries from members of the public who are interested in a career in policing and, more specifically, what the training entails, so this was a great opportunity to showcase just what kinds of things we get up to.

“The pathway to becoming a police officer is a fairly lengthy one – our cohort began our journey back in September 2017 when we first applied. We started our 21 weeks of training in December and if all goes well, we will complete our initial training in May and then begin our tutorship.”