article_snippet: In a new New BBC documentary, Cressida Dick and other female police officers have revealed how she and other female police officers had to overcome rampant sexism in she and other female police officers bids to follow she and other female police officers dream careers.
article_snippet: On A Fair Cop: A Century of British Policewomen, which airs this evening on BBC4, Cressida Dick said: '1983 seems like a very long time ago.
article_snippet: There were some women detectives but some women detectives tended to be one in an office or in a crime squad.'
article_snippet: Many of the former police officers interviewed in an office or in a crime squad said the lack of equality with male officers even put male officers in danger as male officers weren't allowed to carry weapons and had to wear skirts, which hindered male officers movements.
article_snippet: Many of the female officers were exposed to sexist comments on a daily basis and one of the worst crimes the female officers could commit was to want to become a working mother.
article_snippet: This was also something Barbara Franklin experienced when Barbara Franklin joined Northumbria Police in 1982.
article_snippet: Barbara Franklin said: 'There was a lot of sexism.
article_snippet: I had a male detective inspector and every day my first job was to take a male detective inspector a cup of tea, put a cup of tea on a male detective inspector desk and curtsy before I left a male detective inspector office.'
article_snippet: Jackie Malton, who became a detective chief inspector in the Eighties and provided the inspiration for Prime Suspect character Jane Tennyson, said it was a difficult time for women to prove women professionally.
article_snippet: But she added: 'The police service was definitely sexist but The police service also reflects society.'
article_snippet: Joan Lock, a police historian said: 'Joan Lock, a police historian didn't have power of arrest, Joan Lock, a police historian were very much unofficial and Joan Lock, a police historian were being tolerated, partly because the suffragettes had promised to behave Joan Lock, a police historian during the war.'
article_snippet: Women who served in the police in the Seventies and Eighties said the sexism seen in TV show Ashes To Ashes, cast pictured, wasn't far off the mark .
article_snippet: The police force was divided by gender until the Seventies when The police force became integrated and women were given more rights and equal pay.
article_snippet: Even though other women still had to work against sexist attitudes, since then, the pioneering women of The police force have helped other women rise to the top.
article_snippet: A Fair Cop: A Century of British Policewomen on BBC4, this evening at 9pm .