Put a curb on the police, perhaps, or give them more power (9)
I believe the answer is:
reinforce
'put' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both to do with communicating as well as being verbs in their base form.
Maybe you can see an association between them that I can't see?
'a curb on the police perhaps or give them more power' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'curb' could be 'rein' (I've seen this in another clue) and 'rein' is located in the answer.
'police' could be 'force' (the force can refer to the police force) and 'force' is located in the answer.
No letters remain.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for reinforce that I've seen before include "increase support" , "give added support" , "Make stronger" , "Strengthen or support with confrerie" , "Give added strength to" .)