Why any fair minded person Special briefing for members on the Winsor Report recommendations will be angry Foreword by MPF Chairman Peter Smyth P olice pay has, over the years, been subject to various reviews and government-enforced changes. This has resulted in a very complicated pay structure. Winsor has not only failed to simplify it but, if anything, his recommendations will complicate it still further. The media has had much to say about allowances. But these were introduced instead of straightforward increases in basic salary because it suited governments to do it that way. To try and claim these allowances as perks as many commentators have is disingenuous to say the least. They are part of the police pay package and should be simplified or incorporated into basic pay but not simply abolished. Winsor goes to great lengths in an attempt to demonstrate that many officers will be better off as a result of his recommendations. But close examination shows that only a very small number of officers will gain from them. Number of assumptions Winsor makes a number of assumptions, which are not justified by the evidence. Our calculations are that nearly all officers will be worse off; many substantially so. We accept the country is facing an economic crisis. But if we are all in this together, as the Prime Minister assures us we are, let s share the pain equally, not punish the men and women who are dedicated to public service, often risking significant personal injury and worse in the process. Officers already face a two-year pay freeze at a time of rising inflation and the prospect of a three per cent cut caused by To next page THE HUTTON REVIEW OF PENSIONS: BACK PAGE
increased pension contributions. This is true of all public sector workers. BUT ONLY THE POLICE ARE BEING SINGLED OUT FOR FURTHER CUTS IN PAY. We are told that our current arrangements for pay and conditions are archaic. Yet these arrangements only came into being in 2002, with police pay and overtime regulations being overhauled in 2003 and again in 2007. Perhaps our inability to take industrial action is a more significant reason for singling us out for special treatment. Because, of course, if the Federation or anyone else suggested any course of action outside of the normal negotiating procedures, we or they could well end up on the criminal charge of spreading disaffection. Perhaps, therefore, we can be forgiven for believing we are being bullied simply because the Government assumes we cannot fight back. In this newsletter you will find a full list of all 62 recommendations from the Winsor report. Many do not affect our members, being aimed instead at Police Staff and ACPO, and on these we have felt it inappropriate to comment. But in respect of the rest, you will find our view of how they could affect officers. The Prime Minister has made much of the Big Society but what sort of society is it when the Government plainly does not value dedicated public servants? Surely society still needs fire fighters, nurses, teachers and, of course, a brave dedicated police service. Didn t this government say we are all in this together, or is it a more Orwellian approach and some of us are more in it together than others? Please do not be fooled by Government statements and what some of the media are saying. The truth is: if the Winsor recommendations are implemented as they stand, they will cause lasting damage not only to the pay of police officers, but also to our members right to a proper work/life balance. Many members have contacted us to express their disgust at the proposals. They are right to be furious all police officers and their families should be. A cut of police officers pay by 20 per cent over two years which is what we believe officers are facing should cause any fairminded person to be angry. When the Hutton report on public sector pensions is added to the mix, the picture becomes even more muddled and potentially much worse. Hutton takes a generic view of public sector pensions, and is unspecific about police pensions. It is therefore very difficult to work out how his recommendations may affect police officers. What is clear is that his recommendations, if adopted, will be another kick in the teeth for the loyal men and women who do their very best to serve our communities. The Metropolitan Police Federation, together with our colleagues at the Police Federation of England & Wales are resolutely committed to fighting these proposals, which, if adopted, will cause incalculable damage to British policing for years to come. We will keep you, the members, fully updated with details of the campaign. PETER SMYTH The negotiating process The Winsor Review has been delivered to Home Secretary Theresa May, who will now consider it before forwarding to the Police Negotiating Board (PNB) whichever recommendations she suggests should be adopted. PNB consists of Official Side (Home Office, police authorities etc) and Staff Side (Police Federations, Superintendents Association etc). Negotiations will then take place within PNB. If agreement cannot be reached on any recommendation, there will be a period of conciliation. If there is still no agreement, the issue can be referred to an Arbitration Panel, which will decide the issue. At the end of the process all those recommendations where agreement has been reached or which have been settled by an Arbitration Panel go back to the Home Secretary for her approval. When in Opposition, the Conservative Party promised to introduce binding arbitration, which would mean that the Home Secretary could not overrule an Arbitration Panel decision without a full vote in Parliament. To date, the Government has not introduced this change, and the Home Secretary continues to have the final say.
Responses to the recommendations Recommendation 2 Police constables, sergeants, inspectors and chief inspectors should receive an additional 10 per cent of their basic pay, on an hourly basis, for hours worked between 8.00 pm and 6.00 am (nonpensionable). This is a sweetener but will only slightly ameliorate the deterioration in pay resulting from the other recommendations and, even then, only for certain officers. It will be time-consuming to administer and is open to managerial abuse. It will also disadvantage officers who wish to perform other roles as part of their career development or are posted to jobs which do not attract this allowance. And why is this money not pensionable? Recommendation 5 Determination Annex E, made under Regulation 22 of the Police Regulations 2003, should be amended to require the chief officer to consult, rather than agree, with the local joint branch board and individual officers in connection with the bringing in to operation of a variable shift arrangement. That consultation should take place over a period of at least 30 days. Before making his decision, the chief officer should be required to consult the affected officers and take full account of their individual Recommendation 6 Determination Annex G, made under Regulation 25 of the Police Regulations 2003, should be amended to replace time and a third premium pay for casual overtime with plain time. The minimum hours for being recalled between duty should be abolished and instead paid at plain time for the hours worked, with travelling time. Freed to a large degree of budgetary constraints, managers will simply sweat the assets, demanding that circumstances, including the likely effects of the new arrangement on their personal circumstances. New shift arrangements should not be brought into effect earlier than 30 days after the communication of the decision of the chief officer. This will have massively adverse consequences for officers. Senior officers may pay lip service to consultation but if they are given the power to manage by diktat they will wield it with relish. Concerns over work/life balance for officers will be seen as tiresome and will be ignored. Officers will end up working on shifts which leave them stranded when they finish because there no public transport running. In London, abuse is particularly likely at certain times of the year, such as during the run-up to the Notting Hill Carnival. Recommendation 7 Determination Annex H, made under Regulation 26 of the Police Regulations 2003, should be amended to remove double time officers work longer hours than necessary as a lazy alternative to managing resources properly. Officers will lose income while being forced to take on additional work. When policing public protests and demonstrations, officers can work extremely long hours in arduous and dangerous conditions, and in the face of sustained violent hostility. It is morally indefensible to suggest that overtime worked in these conditions is only worth plain time. This represents a serious attack on officers pay and conditions. premium pay and the notice period of five days for working on a rostered rest day. Time and a half premium pay should be payable for working on a rostered rest day with fewer than 15 days notice. As with Recommendation 6, this will provide an irresistible temptation to management to use officer overtime to paper over the cracks in their own poor planning or as an easy alternative to managing resources properly. Abuse of officers and cancellation of leave will therefore become more common, thereby disrupting the lives of officers and their families for example, it is relatively easy to arrange child care, etc when given more than 14 days notice but virtually impossible with two days notice. The less than five days rule was there to protect officers rest time, not increase their earnings. Recommendation 8 Determination Annex H, made under Regulation 26 of the Police Regulations 2003, should be
amended to allow the payment of overtime at double time for 25 December and seven other days chosen for the next financial year by the officer before 31 January. Cancellation with fewer than 15 days notice should require the authority of an Assistant Chief Constable It is not at all clear how this would work further clarification is needed. For example, could any or all officers nominate days during the Olympics as their bank holiday leave days? The requirement that an ACC or equivalent rank should give authority before the chosen days suffer short-notice cancellation provides little protection against abuse. Recommendation 11 - Police officers on mutual aid service should be paid for the hours they are required to work each day, plus travelling time to and from the place of duty. Where those hours coincide with the unsocial hours period, or the duty has been required at short notice and they are eligible for the new overtime rates, the officer should be paid at the applicable premium rates. Officers are entitled to expect some compensation for being away from home. There are issues about what officers are allowed to do when away on call. Recommendation 12 - The definition of proper accommodation should be revised to describe a single occupancy room with use of en suite bathroom R ecommendation 13 Officers held in reserve on a day and who have not been paid for any mutual aid tour of duty that day, should receive the on-call allowance of 15 for that day. Under this recommendation, management will find it inexpensive it represents an hourly rate of 1.80 for an eight-hour day to keep officers away for protracted periods and will consequently indulge in this practice to an unwarranted extent. Officers will find insulting the paltry recompense for putting their lives on hold. facilities. Where such accommodation is not provided, the officer should receive a payment of 30 per night. The current definition of higher standard accommodation should be removed and not replaced. The proposed new definition of proper accommodation is welcome. However, management may often find it cheaper to pay the 30 than to fund this accommodation. Recommendation 14 The Police Advisory Board should establish and publish improved guidance as to the types of outside jobs and business interests which are likely to lead to the rejection of applications in this respect. This should be done after consultation with potentially affected parties or their representatives. The value or otherwise of this rather depends on how PAB defines improved, although, of course, clarity and transparency are always good. Some officers may need a secondary source of income to make ends meet. Recommendation 15 Regulation 7(5) of the Police Regulations 2003 should be amended to remove the Secretary of State from the appeals process. The regulation in question relates to officers business interests which may assume greater importance in future as police pay falls and officers are forced to look for supplementary income sources. Recommendation 20 Police officers and all members of police staff below the top of their pay scale should be suspended at that increment for a twoyear period commencing September 2011. This is another pay-cutting element of the recommendations and, as such, must be robustly challenged. It will hit the most vulnerable officers hardest those who are young in service, with young children, high mortgages and little opportunity to acquire savings. Recommendation 21 The current systems of performance-related pay should be suspended until September 2013. Federated ranks in the MPS do not receive this form of performance-related pay and won t do until an effective PDR programme is established. Recommendation 22 Forces reviewing their performance and development systems and training for managers should do so in the knowledge that they may be used in determining pay within the next two to three years. This recommendation will assume relevance only if managers are given the proper training, time and support to enable them to conduct honest appraisals upon which pay might be determined. In this respect, history is not encouraging. The MPA accepts that the MPS performance and development system is not fit for purpose. Recommendation 23 There should be no changes to the present basic pay arrangements for Chief Constables and Deputy Chief Constables. And there is no surprise about this within the Federation. Recommendation 28 The higher basic pay for London inspectors and chief inspectors should be retained in the
short term. This is naturally good news for the inspecting ranks but, by implication, there are less favourable plans for the long term. Recommendation 29 Competence Related Threshold Payments should be abolished from 31 August 2011 and all outstanding CRTP payments up to that date should be paid on a pro-rated basis. The Federation s response is the same as that to Recommendation 21. We also say that this will have a massive impact on officers at the top of their pay scale, especially those that have been there for some time. CRTP came in to retain experienced officers and incentivise them to carry on working to a competent level. Is this no longer thought to be important? This is pensionable, and officers have paid contributions on this element of pay for nine years. Recommendation 30 Chief officers should continue to be able to make ex gratia payments of 50 to 500 to any officer to recognise a piece of work which is outstandingly demanding, unpleasant or important. This system is open to abuse or, at the very least, inappropriate application. It must be made clear whether or not there is a compulsory percentage of the budget allocated for these payments if there isn t, they won t be paid. Recommendation 31 Chief officers should recognise whole teams, both officers and staff, with a team recognition award payment of 50 to 100 each for outstandingly demanding, unpleasant or important work, or outstanding work for the public. The Federation s response is the same as its comment on Recommendation 30. In addition, these could prove to be divisive if harder-working members of a team see lesser-working members getting the same award as they do for less effort. Recommendation 33 Special Priority Payments should be abolished from 31 August 2011 and all outstanding SPPs up to that date should be paid on a prorated basis. The Federation s response is the same as its comment on Recommendation 29, with the exception of the pension element. Recommendation 34 An interim Expertise and Professional Accreditation Allowance of 1,200 per annum should be introduced from September 2011 for officers meeting the skills or length of service criteria in the four stated priority functions. It should be paid monthly and pro-rated where an officer works part-time. It should be removed when an officer leaves the qualifying role. The payments would go some way towards offsetting the loss of income caused by other recommendations but only for a fortunate few. And they threaten to be divisive, causing problems in the way that SPPs have done. Such payments could severely reduce opportunities for officers to develop their skills in a variety of roles. Recommendation 35 The Expertise and Professional Accreditation Allowance should be expanded or replaced when a more sophisticated system of job banding or professional accreditation is established and has been introduced. This threatens to be an administrative nightmare and prompts questions about personal responsibility for professional accreditation. Recommendation 40 The section on officer accommodation in the Guide to
conditions of service for police officers seconded to central services should be revised. The presumption should be that officers are accommodated in property owned by the relevant organisation or wider police service. Only when no such property is available should private rental property be used, and the cost of accommodation should be kept to a reasonable minimum, including an expectation of approximately 30 minutes traveling time to work. Officers should only be reimbursed for actual accommodation or purchase of a property in exceptional circumstances. We note that much police property is likely to be disposed of for financial reasons Recommendation 42 Regional allowances should remain unchanged in the short term. This obviously raises questions over what happens in the long term. Recommendation 43 The replacement allowance for housing should remain. However, the amount an officer receives should not increase from 31 August 2011 with changes in personal circumstances, such as promotion. The existing framework, by which the amount an officer receives reduces when he lives with another officer also receiving the allowance, should remain. The retention of the payment allowance is good news, although the freezing of the sum involved when an individual s circumstances change could represent a loss for some people. Recommendation 44 A national on-call allowance for the Federated ranks should be introduced from September 2011. The amount of the allowance should be 15 for each occasion of oncall after the officer in question has undertaken 12 on-call sessions in the year beginning on 1 September. An oncall occasion should be defined as the requirement to be on-call within any 24-hour period related to the start-ofthe-police-day. The proposed allowance is lamentable. Why should officers do 12 sessions for nothing? It will encourage abuse by management. Recommendation 45 The national oncall allowance should be reviewed by the Police Negotiating Board three years after its introduction in the context of better management data. There is no need for this length of time to elapse before a review. Recommendation 46 The link between the Motor Vehicle Allowance for police officers and that for local authorities should be re-established from September 2011. This is welcome but will only benefit a small number of officers Recommendation 48 Officers maternity entitlement should increase from 13 weeks at full pay to 18 weeks at full pay, with officers having the option, with the agreement of their chief officer, to spread the final five weeks of maternity pay over 10 weeks at reduced rate. Good news for officers who plan to have children. Recommendation 52 All police forces should take steps to learn from those police forces which have attained best
The other recommendations The Winsor Report includes a number of recommendations which do not directly affect Federated ranks and upon which, therefore, we have no immediate views. They are as follows R ecommendation 1 The Police Service of Northern Ireland and the Northern Ireland Policing Board should review the Northern Ireland transitional allowance with a view to increasing the rate by 12.5% to 2,994 for September 2010/11. R ecommendation 3 Police staff should not receive additional shift premium (time and a half or double time) for weekend day working if it is part of their normal contracted hours. The rate for routinely working a public holiday should be reduced to double time only. This should be agreed in the Police Staff Council and incorporated into individual contracts of employment using the established mechanisms for doing so. In the case of police forces outside the PSC arrangements, these changes should be agreed in the usual manner with the relevant unions. Recommendation 4 The Office of National Statistics should consider disaggregating police staff in their Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings in the future, so that their pay can be more easily compared and understood Recommendation 9 The Police Staff Council s handbook, Section 1, paragraph 6.1.2 should be amended to provide for the payment of additional hours of Sunday working at the rate of time and a half. This should be agreed in the Police Staff Council and incorporated into contracts of employment using the established mechanisms for doing so. In the case of police forces outside the PSC arrangements, these changes should be agreed in the usual manner with the relevant unions. R ecommendation 10 - For working public holidays, police staff should receive double time for working on 25 December and on seven other days chosen for the next financial year by the employee in question before 31 January. Cancellation with fewer than 15 days notice should require the authority of an Assistant Chief Constable. This should be agreed in the Police Staff Council and incorporated into contracts of employment using the established mechanisms for doing so. In the case of police forces outside the PSC arrangements, these changes should be agreed in the usual manner with the relevant unions. R ecommendation 16 A medal should be awarded for five years service as a special constable. Recommendation 17 Special constables should be eligible for police team recognition awards alongside regular police officers and police staff. Recommendation 18 Special constables should be eligible for all new police medals. R ecommendation 1 9 The Special Constables (Amendment) Regulations 2002 should continue to be used in connection with the provision of financial rewards for special constables, where police forces consider that they will be effective and represent value for money, but the role of the Home Secretary in approving those schemes should be removed. R ecommendation 2 4 Assistant Chief Constables should move from their current pay scales on to a single rate for the job based on the weight of what they do, in the same way as their Chief Constable and Deputy Chief Constable colleagues. Part 2 of this review will set out in more detail how such a scheme should be implemented. Recommendation 25 The chief officer bonus scheme should be suspended for a two-year period commencing September 2011. Recommendation 26 The postrelated allowance for chief superintendents should be retained at its present level for the short-term, to reflect the different weights of jobs at the same rank. Recommendation 27 The bonus scheme for superintendents and chief superintendents should be suspended for a two-year period commencing September 2011. R ecommendation 3 2 ACPO and the Police Federation of England and Wales, along with other interested parties, should convene a working group to establish a series of new national policing awards. R ecommendation 3 6 Arrangements for police forces to recognise the skills of police staff should remain unchanged in the short term. Recommendation 37 Police Authorities should be required to pay all reasonable costs arising from the sale and purchase of a chief officer s house, and should pay all tax liabilities arising from any relocation packages, so that, for the chief officer concerned, there is no personal financial disadvantage. R ecommendation 38 Police Authorities should publish details of all benefits for chief officers and their values in their annual reports, itemised by officer. R ecommendation 39 Chief officers should provide receipts for all expenses, and information as to expenses above 50 paid to chief officers should be published quarterly on the Police Authority s website. R ecommendation 41 Receiving organisations should list where they have agreed exceptional accommodation charges with officers in their annual report on an anonymised basis. R ecommendation 47 First-class travel expenses for the ranks of superintendent and above should be published quarterly on the force s website. R ecommendation 49 Staff standby allowance should be reduced to 15 from September 2011. R ecommendation 50 First-class travel expenses for police staff members should be published quarterly on the force s website. R ecommendation 51 Regulation 13 of the Police Regulations 2003, which allows for the dismissal of officers, should be retained for probationary officers. R ecommendation 55 The Police Pension Regulations should be amended to allow chief officers to make a choice in relation to the time at which their pension benefits crystallise. R ecommendation 56 The existing regime concerning the severance terms which may be provided to Chief Constables and Deputy Chief Constables should be retained in the short-term. R ecommendation 60 The current system of severance for police staff, with its local flexibility, is appropriate and should remain.
practice in the area of the handling of poor performance and discipline, including in the training of supervisors who may have to use UPP procedures. The Federation has been calling as a matter of urgency for supervisors to be properly trained in UPP procedures, so this is welcomed. Recommendation 53 Police forces should collaborate to identify a cadre of Assistant Chief Constables who specialise in unsatisfactory performance and attendance procedures and hear cases across police force boundaries. This is acceptable as far as it goes but we question why there should only be a cadre of chief officers specialising in UPP. Shouldn t all officers of this rank and stature be fully versed in UPP? This is better news for the police authority than for the officers it affects, who now have to wait two months for appointment rather than one, as at present. The Authority, on the other hand, can sort the appointment out almost at its leisure. Recommendation 61 Forces and their occupational health departments should continue to develop and improve schemes to monitor the use of longterm sickness, recuperative duty and restricted duty, to improve the management of those on restricted duties and work with officers to bring them back to full duties as quickly as possible. This is not achievable in the MPS with the existing HR and OH systems and procedures Recommendation 54 The Police (Performance) Regulations 2008 should be amended to provide that if a police officer has had two or more adverse determinations made against him, on substantive (rather than procedural) grounds, in concluded UPP proceedings within the past five years, subsequent UPP proceedings should begin at Stage 3. We question the need for this change. Current Regulations deal with these perfectly adequately. Recommendation 57 The criteria for the use of the powers in Regulation A19 should be amended, with servicecritical skills and performance being explicit considerations. This does nothing to guarantee impartiality on the part of chief officers when deciding which individuals are to suffer from the application of A19. Much more precision is needed in the wording of the criteria. Recommendation 58 As quickly as possible, police forces should be provided with the ability to offer voluntary exit terms to police officers, substantially on the terms contained in the Civil Service Compensation Scheme 2010. We will be in a better position to comment on the desirability or otherwise of this recommendation once the uncertainties over the future of police pensions have been resolved. Recommendation 59 Regulation 5(4) of the Police Regulations 2003 should be amended so that an officer giving written notice to return from part-time to full-time working, must be appointed by the Police Authority within two months if the force has a suitable vacancy, and within four months of the notice being received. Recommendation 62 Current sickness policies should remain unchanged in the short term. Again, we have to ask: what happens on the long term? The Hutton Review: many questions but few answers This review is generic and deals with all public sector pensions. We were expecting the review to answer many of the questions which have been posed in recent months with regard to specific contributions and the introduction of changes to either police pension scheme. But what we ve got is document containing no answers but, instead, a framework for government to use in reaching decisions in the future. Much, therefore, remains unclear. For example, the Chancellor has already stated that public sector employers would have to pay an increase in pension contributions, and this would be AVERAGED at a three per cent increase. There is nothing in Hutton which tells us what the percentage increase could be for police or how such an increase may be implemented. What Hutton does appear to recommend is that accrued rights are protected. While this is good news it is not fully explained. We already know the government is changing our indexation arrangements from the Retail Price Index to the Consumer Price Index a move, if successful, which will lead to a substantial reduction in the value of police pensions. Hutton APPEARS to also recommend that police pensions move from a final salary scheme to an average earnings scheme. Again it is not clear how this could work but the clear conclusion must be that this will result in police pensions being smaller. It is also recommended that police do not retire and receive their pension until aged 60. Again there is no detail on how such a draconian move could be implemented. Were the Hutton recommendations to be implemented, it APPEARS that any officer still serving in the future could face an extension in service to aged 60 years, a substantial part of their pension being calculated on the average earnings basis rather that final salary. All of this would be in addition to very substantial rise in contributions and the indexation changes already mentioned. Once we have further information on pensions we will let members know. For the time being we remain committed to fighting these proposals.