“Properly pay police officers for working Bank Holidays”

THE Chairman of South Yorkshire Police Federation has hit out at requests from Chief Officers to scrap a number of police officer Bank Holidays and the overnight allowance.

Neil Bowles (pictured) said: “If you’re going to have people working Bank Holidays or away from home they need to be recompensed for it at the appropriate rate.” He also supported the national Federation in their request for a 2.8% police officer pay rise.

In their submissions to the Police Pay Review Body (PRRB), as well as calling for a 1% pay rise, chief officers in England and Wales have recommended scrapping the away from home allowance and all Bank Holidays – apart from Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.

“Chief Officers can’t manage their staff properly and they never have been able to,” said Mr Bowles.  “Christmas comes as a surprise every year. Guy Fawkes night… lo and behold it’s on the fifth of November, what are we going to do about it? Just get your staff planned appropriately.

“The Chiefs said apparently that bank holidays are a third of our overtime budget, well so what? So what if it’s a third?

“We have to work 365 days a year, and yet other working professions are compensated for working weekends and upgraded for Bank Holidays. So why pick on police officers that they shouldn’t be recompensed for working on bank holidays? Some are busy and some are quiet, allocate resources accordingly.”

As for looking to cancel the overnight allowance – currently £50 or £80 depending on conditions – Mr Bowles added: “It’s cost cutting. No officer joined South Yorkshire Police with the expectation to be posted in Cardiff, policing some sort of conference. So if people are away from home then they should be recompensed by an allowance.”

Speaking about the National Federation’s request for a 2.8% police officer pay rise in 2016, Mr Bowles said: “We certainly support that. The evidence goes to prove that we need more than 1% just to even claw back some of the amount of money we’ve lost in real terms in the last six years. The evidence is there.

“And I certainly don’t believe that it should be targeted, it’s across the board. We’re all Constables and we can all be deployed at any sort of Constable role at the whim of the Chief Constable, so targeting pay rises is just a divisive idea like Special Priority Payments and Competency related Threshold Payments were.”