THE Police Arbitration Tribunal has ruled that compulsory severance will not be introduced for police officers.<\/p>\n
Arbiters decided that introducing officer redundancy to the service would be a \u201cmomentous change\u201d and that the case for bringing it into the service was not \u201ccompelling\u201d.<\/p>\n
However a final decision still lies in the hands of Home Secretary Theresa May.<\/p>\n
Mark Smith, chairman of Essex Police Federation, said: “I hope the Home Secretary ratifies the Police Arbitration Tribunal decision – as she has done in the past.”<\/p>\n
The three person arbitration panel, chaired by Prof John Goodman CBE, \u201crejected\u201d recommendation 46 of the Winsor 2 pay and conditions review, which wanted: \u201cThe introduction of a system of compulsory severance for police officers with less than full pensionable service from April 2013.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the Tribunal ruling \u2013 which was published on 20 December \u2013 \u201cthe Tribunal recognised that for the Staff Side the introduction of compulsory severance would represent a momentous change\u201d and \u201cthe Official Side presented compulsory severance as a measure of last resort\u201d.<\/p>\n
It added: \u201cThe Tribunal was not convinced that the introduction of compulsory severance would set in train negative practices, such as targeting particular officers or groups of officers for compulsory severance, in the manner suggested by the Staff Side.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Staff Side\u2019s presentation of the possible damaging effects on the \u2018psychological contract\u2019 between officers and forces was, in the Tribunal\u2019s view, more persuasive.<\/p>\n
\u201cOfficers were required to accept a number of sacrifices and restrictions in their personal lives and, on occasion, put themselves in harm\u2019s way. The knowledge that despite making these sacrifices, an officer could still then be subject to compulsory severance as part of workforce planning was, in the Tribunal\u2019s view, detrimental to the mutuality of commitment between officers and forces.\u201d<\/p>\n
The ruling stated: \u201cThere have been many changes introduced into the police service in recent years. On balance, these changes have resulted in a deterioration in police officers\u2019 terms and conditions.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe introduction of compulsory severance would be yet another change, probably more far-reaching than all of the others.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn principle, the case for the introduction of such a fundamental measure, whether used or not, needed to be compelling. In the Tribunal\u2019s view, this was not the case.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Police Federation of England and Wales said after the PAT decision \u201cclearly this is the best possible outcome for rank and file officers.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the Fed, on restricted duties, the Staff and Official Sides only differed on one recommendation, recommendation 39.<\/p>\n
The view put forward by the Official Side on the meaning of restricted duty was accepted, so now the definition and potential pay reduction applies to officers unable to undertake the full range of duties of a police officer. Staff Side remain concerned that this could lead to discrimination for disabled officers.<\/p>\n
Mr Smith added that he has concerns about how officers who are disabled and have suffered injuries on duty will be treated with any changes to restricted duties.<\/p>\n
A Home Office spokesman said:\u00a0“The Home Secretary will now consider the findings of the Police Arbitration Tribunal.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
THE Police Arbitration Tribunal has ruled that compulsory severance will not be introduced for police officers. Arbiters decided that introducing officer redundancy to the service would be a \u201cmomentous change\u201d\u2026 read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":137,"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\/708"}],"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=708"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":710,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/708\/revisions\/710"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essexfedfocus.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}