Pauline Clare was born in Chorley on the 26th of July 1947. Her dad was a Co-op butcher and his job brought the family to Ribchester for a while, where she attended the local junior school of St Peter and St Paul's, then back to Chorley where she was a pupil at St Mary's primary school, Chorley and at Leyland St Mary's secondary modern.
Her rise up the ranks saw her serving in Lancashire, Merseyside and Cheshire. However her story started in Chorley where she became a police cadet at the age of 17 in 1964, then becoming a Police Constable in 1966. She worked in Southport and Kirkby, and then, following local government re-organisation, found herself working for the Merseyside Constabulary, staying in that force for some 27 years. Throughout her time here she was described as an inspiration who transformed the force. During her career she served in every uniformed rank, including becoming an Assistant Chief Constable before becoming Deputy Chief Constable in Cheshire. She says, "When I joined, which was prior to the Sex Discrimination Act, women couldn't be a Chief Constable...When I became Deputy Chief Constable then I started thinking about ideally where I wanted to go."
With her sights set on Lancashire's prized post she recalled: "I prepared really well. I was so determined to get it. I did it three ways - first getting up to date on contemporary policing issues, second spending time at County Hall in Preston researching the issues the police authority were dealing with and reading up about the Constabulary. The third point, which perhaps a lot of people don't do, is preparing themselves - I know this from coaching. (It's) thinking about the sort of impression you want to create of yourself. What’s important to you, what will be important to them and ensuring during interview you give as much of yourself as you possibly can."
She was first woman to hold the rank of Chief Constable when appointed as head of the Lancashire Constabulary on the 14th of June 1995 beating off the competition, which included four senior male officers to land this head job. She won the unanimous backing of the police authority to head one of the largest provincial forces, responsible for 3,200 officers, 500 of them women.
Pauline explains, "I was different and I had a different approach to leadership. When you're bringing about change you have to work differently as well as do different things. It was massive significant change within the Constabulary. It was top to toe. We looked at every single aspect of what we were doing. This ranged from reviewing the organisation's culture and technology to its disciplinary proceedings. It was about trust, openness, challenge and accountability, all part of transformational leadership. I was really putting people at the heart of what we were doing."
She served as Lancashire's Chief Constable for seven years before
stepping down in 2002, when she reached the then retirement age for Chief Constables of 55, and the same year being awarded the CBE. Her
years in charge saw her championing the cause of getting bobbies
back on the beat and leading a shake-up of the force’s structure in a drive
for greater efficiency. Her term saw levels of violent crime and
burglaries fall after making the crimes a top priority.
Under her command crime figures went down and then rose. In the same way she argues that the number of recorded racial incidents went up because people felt confident in reporting them: "Then they went down because we worked in relationship with all sorts of other organisations and community representatives to work to achieve reduced figures. It’s all about transparency." When she left it in 2002 it was assessed by HMI (Her Majesty’s Inspectorate) as the best performing force in England and Wales.
At 55, on completing the permitted seven year contract, she recognised she was not ready to retire, so retrained as a coach. She reflected, "As the first woman in that position I was a role model, not just in the police service, but for other organisations. I also think there were a few people around waiting to see how I performed – whether it was a terrible mistake appointing a woman in a man's job. I have been conscious that they have been there throughout and that is an additional responsibility."
see also:- http://www.thefootballvoice.com/2020/12/a-liverpool-exemplar-william-ewart.html
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