Home Office Letter To PRRB Is ‘Political Gamesmanship’

The Government is using last year’s police pay rise to justify underpaying and under-recognising officers this year, South Yorkshire Police Federation has said.

Home Secretary James Cleverly has sent a letter to the Police Remuneration Review Body (PRRB) reminding it that last year it recommended “historically high pay awards” and that this year it was vital that it consider the “Government’s affordability position”.

South Yorkshire Police Federation Chair Steve Kent said: “This was my concern at the time – even though a 7% pay rise wasn’t even enough, it was historically high, and I thought we’d see the Government using that benchmark as a way to justify underpaying us and under-recognising us the following year.

“This is really concerning messaging from the Government. It’s political gamesmanship, and nobody is having a conversation about long-term repair to police pay decimation.”

Steve said the Home Secretary’s letter confirmed the importance of the Federation’s vote on industrial rights, which could help redress “the absolute lottery of police pay”. He added that the Federation shouldn’t rejoin the PRRB until it has binding powers.

Steve continued: “If we’d been receiving fair pay rises the whole time, then last year’s 7% would be a real positive. But all it does is keep us at pace with inflation, it totally neglects the past 10 years.

“There needs to be continual wage growth to redress the balance, which would mean 7-10% for the next three years or, if it’s one-off, 21%, bearing in mind inflation.

“We are some of the poorest paid police officers on average in the Western world. If you look at Italy, a Western country but with a significantly weaker economy than Britain’s and a lower cost of living, their police officers are paid more than us on average. It’s totally unacceptable. We’ve been a political pawn for too long. We need a fundamental review into police pay and conditions.

“We talk about attracting high-quality police officers, but you’ve got to pay officers the right amount to get the talent in, and to keep it. We are policing in the most unbelievably hostile climate at the minute, with portions of the media dining out on the actions of the minority. Not to mention the dangers our officers are facing. It’s a thankless task.

“I can see a real issue on the horizon where we could have significant retention problems, especially when the cost of living keeps going up and new officers may think: ‘Why am I doing this, for this amount of money?’”