POLICE chiefs have defended a bonus system for officers who perform \u201cparticularly unpleasant\u201d tasks \u2013 including dealing with dead bodies and attending difficult fatal road accidents.<\/p>\n
ACPO said the payments recognise when the work being done can test \u201ceven the most seasoned\u201d of officers. Steve White, from the Police Federation, said: \u201cOfficers\u2019 remuneration should reflect the sometimes extraordinary tasks they are asked to perform.\u201d<\/p>\n
Figures obtained by the Mail on Sunday using the Freedom of Information Act 2000 showed some police officers and staff are paid compensation ranging from \u00a350 to \u00a3500 for tasks including attending the scene of a car crash or murder.<\/p>\n
Thames Valley Police, for instance, expects to pay out \u00a31,000 in the current financial year for workers who have to handle corpses, and \u00a345,000 to officers and teams who carry out demanding or important work as well as unpleasant tasks, the newspaper claimed.<\/p>\n
The paper added that Dorset Police said it paid out about \u00a32,000 for unpleasant work last year while Gwent Police spent \u00a31,900, including three payments of \u00a3100 to officers who had to recover bodies. South Yorkshire Police paid out \u00a32,700 in 2011-12 for unpleasant work.<\/p>\n
The most detailed breakdown came from Hertfordshire Constabulary, which paid out \u00a32,050 last year for \u2018exceptionally unpleasant\u2019 work \u2018over and above\u2019 normal duties.<\/p>\n
One PC, the paper said, received \u00a3250 for \u2018body retrieved from river which had been there for some time\u2019, while a colleague got \u00a3200 when they \u2018attended murder\/suicide scene and assisted with the removal of the bodies\u2019.<\/p>\n
Two officers shared \u00a3400 to deal with \u2018male hit by train \u2013 body dismembered\u2019 and a sergeant got \u00a3200 when they were \u2018witness to man who shot himself in chest and then assisted medical staff in extreme circumstances\u2019.<\/p>\n
ACPO\u2019S national policing lead for recognition and reward, Thames Valley\u2019s Deputy Chief Constable Francis Habgood, said: \u201cEven within policing there are some tasks we have to do which are particularly outstanding in their nature and which even the most experienced of police officers can find emotionally draining and challenging.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a small proportion of such cases, but even the most seasoned of officers deserve some recognition for particularly unpleasant tasks, tasks which can include for instance; searching a decomposing body or removing fatalities from a particularly distressing scene.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese bonuses are not designed to reward officers for merely doing their day-to-day jobs, but to recognise when the task at hand can try even the toughest emotional and professional resolve.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr White added: \u201cWhile police officers are expected to undertake a wide range of work as part of their day-to-day responsibilities they are occasionally required to perform tasks which are particularly unpleasant.<\/p>\n
\u201cChief officers have the discretion to recognise such work with what is often a very modest payment and officers who have carried out such duties are entitled to this recognition.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
POLICE chiefs have defended a bonus system for officers who perform \u201cparticularly unpleasant\u201d tasks \u2013 including dealing with dead bodies and attending difficult fatal road accidents. ACPO said the payments\u2026 read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":75,"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\/538"}],"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=538"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":539,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions\/539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/75"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}