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Walking the beat to Nirvana Talk -15 Feb 2019

Mervyn Edwards was a fascinating speaker and gave us an insight into how he moved from being a bus driver in Banbury to a firearms office charged with protecting Margaret Thatcher!

Mervyn was born and bred in Banbury and joined the Thames Valley Police after being a bus driver for Midland Red. In his talk he gave us a summary of his book “Walking the beat to Nirvana” starting with his first posting with TVP which took him away from Banbury and spending 15 years in three different ranks as a specialist firearms officer.

His book details his experiences which include protecting Margaret Thatcher when she returned to Chequers after the Brighton hotel bombing in 1984.

Hegave us a fascinating account of his career ending up with him being responsible for developing the UK’s tactics for dealing with Chemical, Biological Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) terrorist threats, ending his career as a Chief Superintendent. He was also earlier in his career responsible for the policing of the Newbury Bypass protests.