SOME police officers are having to use food banks and even more are seeking financial help, says Essex Police Federation.<\/p>\n
Laura Heggie, Chair of Essex Police Federation, said: \u201cIt\u2019s been recognised that as a force we have some real issues. I know people were shocked when I talked about Essex Police officers going to food banks, and they thought that wasn\u2019t true. It is true. We\u2019ve got officers that, on pay day, are already into their overdraft because of the cost of living.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s still a lot of work to be done. Yes, the \u00a3500 extra South East Allowance is a bonus, but that\u2019s not even going to cover the extra costs we\u2019ll have next year, let alone those people that are already in debt.\u201d<\/p>\n
She continued: \u201cI always ask a new intake of officers, \u2018How many of you have taken a pay cut to come into this organisation?\u2019, and over half of the class put their hand up, that\u2019s normal So you need to look at what is the incentive for people to join the police, especially if you\u2019ve got dependents and a mortgage, some people can\u2019t afford to join this job.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor those who are coming on board, especially when they know the financial impact, full credit to them. We need to be supporting them in every way we can. The force\u2019s welfare department has launched its wellbeing hub, and throughout the year there\u2019ll be virtual wellbeing sessions that officers join.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd the Federation will always signpost officers to where they can get help, these are also on our website\u00a0www.polfed.org\/essex<\/a>. We\u2019ve teamed up with Copper Pot with their Coffee, Cake and Copperpot imitative and we\u2019re going around a number of police stations in March so that Copper Pot can be available to officers to talk through any financial needs that they may be able to assist with.<\/p>\n \u201cI want to make sure that officers are fully aware of the services that the Federation offers. They are really valuable, especially group insurance, so that if they get injured while they\u2019re at work or if they\u2019re off work for any reason, especially if they\u2019re off sick for more than six months, the insurance kicks in. It helps people pay their mortgages.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m also urging officers to check their beneficiaries are up to date, so they know what finance is coming from where should they need to draw on it, the life insurance can also be used to support mortgage applications saving taking an additional policy at cost.\u201d<\/p>\n Laura also sits on the Essex Police Benevolent Fund, which officers can apply for when they find themselves in difficulty, often when their circumstances have changed. She said: \u201cThose applications are coming through far more frequently now. It shows how much people are trying to reach out for assistance, which shouldn\u2019t be happening. Not in this day and age.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" SOME police officers are having to use food banks and even more are seeking financial help, says Essex Police Federation. Laura Heggie, Chair of Essex Police Federation, said: \u201cIt\u2019s been\u2026 read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":214,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183449"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=183449"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":184399,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183449\/revisions\/184399"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=183449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=183449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=183449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}