Police Negotiating Board (PNB) agreement on police pay and conditions

Report: 11
Date: 25 July 2002
By: Clerk

Summary

The Metropolitan Police Authority (MPA) was part of the Association of Police Authorities (APA) representation at the recent PNB discussions on police pay and conditions. This report provides a brief summary of the agreement, together with some discussion of the role of police authorities in ensuring implementation.

A. Recommendations

1. The Human Resources Committee are asked to note the report;
2. to adopt the role outlined at paragraphs 4 and 5; and
3. to receive regular updates as part of the PNB report at each meeting.

B. Supporting information

1. The PNB agreement has been negotiated over a period of more than eight months discussions between the Official and Staff Sides. It is subject to the proviso that sufficient new money is available to all police authorities to cover the net costs of the package. There are also a number of issues, e.g. more flexible deployment of police officers and more flexible working patterns, simplifying the system of regulations and determinations, encouraging police officers to stay beyond 30 years and improving the management of ill-health, which will have to be the subject of further detailed discussion and agreement on the Police Advisory Board (PAB).

2. The key changes made during the conciliation process are:

• Agreement to retain existing premium rates for overtime payments;
• Removal of the proposals on higher starting pay for older recruits; and
• Agreement to a reduction in overall levels of overtime working, with police authorities agreeing with, in London, the Commissioner, local targets for reductions in overtime levels, having regard to a national target of reduction of 15% over three years.

3. Increasing the rewards available to experienced professional police officers

• Competency related (pensionable) payment of £1,002 per annum available to the constable, sergeant, inspector and chief inspector ranks after at least one year at the maximum of the relevant pay scale. It is anticipated that at least 75% of those eligible will be successful in accessing this payment (see Appendix 1). Agreement on the detail of this scheme will be reached by 30 September 2002 with a view to the payments being made from 1 April 2003;
• A shortening of the pay scales of the four federated ranks listed above subject to a minimum increase of £402 per pay point, with effect from 1 April 2003.

4. Achieving greater flexibility and targeted rewards in the pay system

• Special priority payments (non-pensionable) targeted at front line and operational police officers (see Appendix 2). Payments will not be less than £500 or more than £3000 per annum, although exceptionally payments of up to £5000 a year may be made. They will be taxable and payable in December each year, with the first payments due to be made in December 2003. PNB expects no less than 20% and no more than 30% will benefit from this scheme, save in exceptional circumstances. In the first year at least an additional 1% of the force's annual basic pay bill for ranks below ACPO level will be spent on this scheme; in the second year at least 1.5% and in the third year, and thereafter, at least 2%. Funding will be provided centrally to meet these minimum costs. The MPA will wish to be involved with determining the criteria for these payments and to receive regular reports on the use of these payments and their impact on various parts of the MPS.
• Bonus payments of between £50 and £500 per head to recognise occasional work of an outstandingly demanding, unpleasant or important nature, e.g. hostage negotiation, fingerprinting badly decomposed bodies, to be introduced from 1 April 2003 The MPA will wish determine a local policy with the Commissioner following consultation with the staff associations. The MPA will also wish to see an annual report on these payments.

5. Allowing more flexible deployment of police officers and more flexible working patterns

• The 16 hours per week minimum requirement for part time working will be removed as soon as practicable
• The requirement to job share applicable to middle and senior managers will be removed as soon as practicable
• The changes in this agreement make possible better and more flexible use of police officers through, for example, annual rostering arrangements, reducing bureaucracy, increasing the Service strength, etc and provides a good opportunity for improvements in the management of working time. There will be a target of a 15% reduction in the overall overtime bill over three years, beginning 2003/4. The MPA and the Commissioner, in consultation with Her Majesty's Inspector of Constabulary (HMIC), will agree a target for the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS). There will be interim indicative targets set through the same process, in consultation with the MPS Federation. HMIC will be asked to monitor managing down of overtime and improved use and availability of police officers
• Eight days threshold for triggering additional higher rate compensation for working rest days to be reduced to five days from 1 April 2003. The current 15 days trigger point will not change
• Disregard of first half hour of overtime up to four times a week to be applied to time off as well as paid compensation from 1 April 2003.

6. Rationalising the system of allowances and simplifying the system of regulations and determinations

• The following allowances will be maintained for MPS police officers:
  • rent, housing and replacement allowances;
  • London weighting and London allowance;
  • dog handlers' allowances;
  • motor vehicle allowances;
  • allowance in respect of medical charges arising from injuries incurred on duty.

The following allowances will be discontinued from 1 April 2003 unless otherwise stated:

• plain clothes allowance will be halved from 1 April 2003 and discontinued one year later;
• subsistence, refreshment and lodging allowances will be discontinued and officers will be reimbursed actual expenditure provided it is necessary, reasonable, additional to what otherwise would have been incurred and backed up by a receipt;
• removal allowance will be discontinued and replaced by reimbursement for associated expenditure provided it is reasonable, necessary and backed up by receipts;
• firearms users standby allowance and the gratuity for fingerprinting and searching badly decomposed bodies will be discontinued. The first of these allowances will be eligible for payment under the Special Priority Payments scheme and a bonus may be appropriate instead of the gratuity.

A list of the changes to regulations and determinations is attached at Appendix 3.

7. Improving the management of ill health

The key objectives are;

• to ensure that HR practices and the pension regulations combine to ensure that fair and effective decisions are taken on poor attendance and ill health retirements;
• to ensure that, where possible, police officers are rehabilitated for duty rather than retire on ill health grounds; and
• to ensure that there is greater consistency in decision-making practice between forces.

A working party of PNB will agree during 2002 detailed amendments and additions to regulations and guidance that reflect these principles. The principles to achieve the objectives are set out at Appendix 4.

8. Encouraging police officers to stay beyond 30 years

The proposed scheme is designed to encourage police officers to continue in service beyond 30 years, subject to the agreement of the individual and the Service, in the context of a scheme authorised by the police authority. The objectives are to help ease recruitment shortfalls, to smooth out recruitment bulges and to retain much needed skills and experience in the Service. It is hoped to pilot the scheme in at least one force in order to identify the demand and to establish a business case for rolling out the scheme from April 2003. This is subject to Treasury approval. Details of the scheme are attached at Appendix 5.

C. Financial implications

As previously stated, this is subject to the proviso that sufficient new money is available to all police authorities to cover the net costs of the package. A more detailed report on the financial implications of each part of this agreement, including costings, will be made by the MPS at the next meeting of this Committee.

D. Background papers

None.

E. Contact details

Report author: Alan Johnson, HR,MPA

For information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

Appendix 1: Threshold payment scheme

1. There will be a competence-related payment of £1002 per annum beyond the existing scale maxima. This will be uprated (in line with the median of Office of Manpower Economics (OME's) survey of private sector non manual total pay settlements) from 1 September 2004 and annually thereafter. It will be pensionable, taxable and paid monthly.

2. Access to the payments will depend on the individual demonstrating high professional competence under each of the following broad headings:

• Professional competence and results
• Commitment to the job
• Relations with the public and colleagues
• Willingness to learn and adjust to new circumstances.

3. The Federated Ranks Committee of PNB will agree the details and guidance for forces, by 30 September 2002, with a view to the first payments being made from 1 April 2003.

Appendix 2: Special priority payments

1. Police authorities and chief constables will agree, in consultation with the appropriate staff associations, a local scheme of payments in line with the criteria below and having regard to any guidance from the Home Secretary.

2. In the first year at least an additional 1 % of the force's annual basic pay bill for ranks below chief officers will be spent on this scheme; in the second year at least 1½% and in the third year, and thereafter, at least 2%. Funding will be provided centrally to meet these minimum costs.

3. Posts may qualify for payment where they:

• Carry a significantly higher responsibility level than the norm for the rank; or
• Present particular difficulties in recruitment and retention; or
• Have specially demanding working conditions or working environments.

This scheme will be targeted on front line/operational officers in particular.

4. To qualify for payment, officers must demonstrate that they are fully competent in and highly committed to their duties and responsibilities. The PNB expects that no less than 20% of force strength will benefit from this scheme and no more than 30%, save in exceptional circumstances.

5. Payments will be made annually on a one-off basis and should be no less than £500 and no more than £3,000 normally, although exceptionally, payments of up to £5,000 may be made. They will be taxable and non-pensionable.

Appendix 3: Regulations and determinations

References here are to the Police Regulations for England and Wales. Equivalent provisions in Scotland and Northern Ireland will be amended accordingly.

(a) Regulations which it is agreed should be retained

• 1-4 Citation and commencement; references to transfers; references to provisions of these regulations; meanings assigned to certain expressions, etc.
• 6 Ranks
• 9 Restrictions on the private life of members
• 10-11 Business interests
• 12 Qualifications for appointment to a police force
• 15 Discharge of probationer
• 17-19 Personal records
• 20 Fingerprints
• 33 Meetings of Police Federation treated as police duty
• 42-45 Reckoning of previous service
• 47 Deductions from pay of social security benefits and statutory sick pay
• 51 Restriction on payments for private employment of the police
• 62 Continuance of allowances when member ill
• 63 Allowances in respect of periods of suspension
• 65A Replacement allowance
• 70 Revocations and savings

(b) Regulations which it is agreed should be deleted

• 8 Beats, sections, sub-divisions and divisions
• 23 Work not required to be performed
• 53 Plain clothes allowances
• 61 Allowance for recurring escort duty etc
• 65 Frozen "undermanning" allowances
• 71 Temporary provision about deputy chief constable
• Schedule 11 Issue of uniform and equipment

(c) Regulations which it is agreed should become legally enforceable Determinations by the Secretary of State, underpinned by sufficient safeguards in and linked to a substantive Regulation (see Para 6.2)

• 7 Part-time appointments
• 13,13A,13B Appointment of Chief Constable; fixed term appointments for certain ranks; requirement to advertise vacancies in certain ranks
• 14 Probationary service in the rank of constable
• 16 Retirement
• 21 Duty to ca out lawful orders
• 22 Limitations on duties to be assigned to members statutorily transferred
• 24-32 Working Time
• 34 - 37 Leave, including maternity and paternity
• 38 University scholars
• 39 Rate of Pa
• 40,40A Temporary salary and temporary promotion
• 41,41A London weighting
• 46, 46A Sick pay/maternity pay
• 48 Calculation of monthly, weekly and daily pay (to be incorporated in 39)
• 49 Pay Day (to be incorporated in 39)
• 50 Restriction on payment of allowances
• 52,54,55, 56,57,59 Reimbursement of expenses incurred in the course of duty: removal allowance; detective expenses allowance; subsistence, refreshment and lodging allowances; advances to cover expenses when away on duty; motor vehicle allowances; allowance in respect of medical charges
• 58 Dog handlers' allowance
• 60, 60A London allowance, South East allowance
• 64 University scholars
• 66-69 Uniform and Equipment

* The "sufficient safeguards" will be such as to secure that matters covered by a Determination will have the same status before the courts as if they had been made, in a substantive Regulation.

Any change is not intended to alter the existing legal status of the employment relationship of police officers. In making determinations within the PNB jurisdiction the Secretary of State will take into account any recommendation made by PNB. In making determinations within the PABEW jurisdiction, the Secretary of State will consult the PABEW on a draft of the determination and take into consideration any representation made by PABEW.

NB Schedules linked to Regulations which are kept will also be kept unless otherwise provided above. Any Schedules linked to deleted Regulations will be deleted, and those linked to Regulations becoming Determinations will be incorporated into these determinations.

Appendix 4: Improving the management of ill-health

1. The police service should not lose the skills and experience of officers who are still able to make a valuable contribution. Officers should not therefore have to retire on medical grounds unless it is necessary.

2. An assumption that there may be an entitlement to an ill-health pension because an officer is unable to carry out full operational duties can create an unhealthy climate of expectation. There should accordingly be clarity about the criteria for medical retirement and about where responsibility lies for final decisions on medical retirement.

3. To this end, the PNB will issue joint guidance during 2002:

1. Reinforcing the fact that it is senior management and the police authority and not medical advisers who ultimately decide on medical retirements;
2. Advising on the interpretation and application of "ordinary duties" with a view to ensuring wherever possible the retention of officers in service where they are still capable of undertaking sufficient duties to justify continuing employment;
3. Clarifying that "permanent disablement" should be interpreted as meaning that the officer will not be able to work again as a police officer before the compulsory retirement age for the officer concerned, on the assumption that normal medical treatment for the officer's condition is applied in the meantime;
4. To advise on the questions that should be put to selected medical practitioners (SMP);
5. To advise that the two circumstances (in addition to those in 3(b) above) where discretion not to proceed with a medical retirement is most likely to be used are:
   1. where an officer who qualifies for medical retirement wishes to remain in service and the force wishes to retain him or her;
   2. where an officer faces disciplinary proceedings and medical retirement is set aside so that those proceedings can continue in all but the most exceptional cases.

4. In addition, the Police Pensions Regulations will be amended: to remove the distinction between the duties of male and female officers; to include a definition of "infirmity" as a disease or medical condition, including a psychiatric disease or condition; to add a new proviso to Regulation A20 to require police authorities in making their determinations to give due consideration to all the circumstances and advice and information available to them.

Unacceptable attendance

5. The Sides agree to discuss poor attendance management through the Police Advisory Boards during 2002, taking cognisance of ACAS Guidance, tailored to the requirements of the Police Service; and to come to an arrangement through amendments to Police Efficiency Regulations where the aim is to secure improvement in attendance, with sanctions (including the possibility of dismissal) where that fails. The arrangement will include an appropriate appeals mechanism.

Strategies for effective management of medical retirement

6. Police authorities will develop in consultation with staff associations strategies for the effective management of medical retirement that set out the roles and responsibilities of both the force and authority and that place sickness management, occupational health provision and medical retirement in the wider context of effective career management and operational effectiveness.

The strategy should also set out the duties and responsibilities of the force medical adviser (FMA) and the support that management will give to the FMA.

Sick pay within a strategy for managing sickness absence

8. It is recognised that (subject to amendment of Police Regulation 46) the Police Regulations already provide adequate powers for chief officers to exercise discretion over the question of paid sick leave in the interests of supporting or encouraging rehabilitation. Use should be made of this discretion in appropriate cases.

9. Police Regulation 46 (and equivalent Regulations in Scotland and Northern Ireland) will be amended to provide the cumulative method of calculating sickness absence over the previous year when determining whether an officer is due to come off paid sick leave. The PNB will consider guidance in relation to situations where it would be reasonable for chief constables to exercise their discretion favourably to resume/maintain paid sick leave.

Consideration of early retirement on medical grounds

10. Priority should always be given to an appropriate programme of rehabilitation rather than premature consideration of medical retirement. However, where medical retirement does have to be considered, the system should be both fair and transparent. The PNB will consider how best to provide greater clarity as to the sequence of events in the management of medical retirement cases and the roles of the police authority, FMA and SMP. This will include the stage at which cases are referred to the SMP for determination and whether or not there are circumstances in which it is justified to request the SMP to reconsider their determination.

The role of the selected medical practitioner

11. The duties of the SMP will not normally be carried out by the FMA but by somebody removed from the day-to-day care of officers. In exceptional circumstances, there should be a board of three doctors appointed by the police authority rather than a single SMP.

12. SMPs will be provided with, and work to, appropriate medical guidelines drawn up by the Home Office after consultation with both Sides of the PNB.

13. It is recognised that police authorities may wish to collaborate on a regional basis to develop a suitable list of SMPs.

Appeals

14. A fair and transparent system of medical retirement needs to be underpinned by a robust appeals system. The Police Pensions Regulations will therefore be amended so that medical referees appointed by the Home Office are replaced by boards drawn from panels of medical practitioners (similar to the arrangements now in place in the fire service). The appellant may be required to bear the costs in the case of a vexatious or frivolous appeal.

15. The Police Pensions Regulations will be amended to provide for further measures to improve procedures and limit appeals to cases where there are genuine differences of opinion:

• in addition to the current provisions for giving notice of intention to appeal, for which there will now be a 28 day limit, there will be a requirement for the appellant to give a written statement of grounds for appeal within a further 28 days. These limits may be extended at the discretion of the police authority.
• the police authority and the appellant will have the opportunity to agree to an internal review of the SMP's decision in the light of the officer's grounds of appeal, without prejudice to the formal right of appeal.

Appendix 5: 30 years plus scheme

Proposed scheme

Scope

1. The scheme will be open to ranks below ACPO level where a business case can be made for it.

Reappointment not automatic

2. Each officer who wishes to participate will have to apply for selection.

3. Selection will be subject to participants being in satisfactory health.

4. Appointments will be for a term of up to four years, subject to annual renewal dependent on continued effectiveness. In some cases the appointment could be followed by another of up to three years, again subject to annual renewal.

Status on reappointment

5. Participants will no longer be entitled to a replacement allowance. (When levels of rent and housing allowances were frozen in September 1994, they were worth, for the federated ranks, from £2,332 pa in Dyfed-Powys to £5,863 pa in the Met.)

6. Participants will, however, be able to re-enter the force at their former rank, if selected for that rank.

Tax-free lump sum

7. Participants will be able to retire with a tax-free lump sum before appointment to the posts they had applied for.

Partial lifting of pension abatement

8. Participants will be eligible to have their pension partially abated. They will be able to receive sufficient pension to restore their earnings to their pre-retirement level - i.e. including replacement allowance.

Eligibility for special priority post bonus

9. Depending on the post for which they are selected, participants will be eligible for a non-pensionable lump-sum special retention payment at the end of each extra year worked. The payment will be not less than £500 or more than £3,000 normally, although exceptionally payments of up to £5,000 may be made, and will be in line with the proposed extra responsibility payment for which officers in general will be eligible.

Pension position

10. Participants will not be eligible to rejoin the Police Pension Scheme either to resume accrual of rights to their current pension or to accrue rights to a second pension. They will be able to take out a personal pension with a view to receiving additional benefits.

11. Although not members of the Police Pension Scheme, participants will be entitled to injury awards, including awards for death as a result of an injury on duty, as if they had at least 30 years' service.

12. The force will bear the cost of insurance for the payment of the equivalent of a lump-sum death in service grant to the spouse or estate of a participant in the event of death during the currency of his or her appointment. In such a circumstance survivor benefits will become payable as if the officer had died in retirement.

Inland Revenue and Treasury position

13. The Inland Revenue has confirmed in writing the pension position as stated above. Their letter has been circulated to both Sides. The Treasury is sympathetic to the abatement proposals but will need further details before approving it.

Next steps

14. If agreed by the PNB in principle and approved by the Treasury, the next step will be to set up a pilot scheme in at least one force as soon as possible.

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