Police defend polite hikers, essentially, describing representation as accurate (8)
I believe the answer is:
lifelike
'accurate' is the definition.
Both the definition and answer are adjectives. Maybe you can see a link between them that I don't see?
'police defend polite hikers essentially describing representation as' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite see how this works, but
'as' could be 'like' (I've seen this in other clues) and 'like' is located in the answer.
The remaining letters 'life' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't understand.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for lifelike that I've seen before include "Could be mistaken for the real thing, like figure in wax museum" , "True-to-life" , "Realistic" , "Exactly like real person or thing" , "Resembling a real person or thing" .)