Annual Report

National Secretary

NATIONAL SECRETARY REPORT

NATIONAL OFFICE

During the reporting year 2008/09 there were no changes to the Association’s Presidential or Secretariat national post holders, nor to the staff who work at, or work remotely from, National Office in Pangbourne. This stability does not happen most years and when it does it is welcomed.

The office premises, in addition to usual maintenance activities, were altered to accommodate the appointment of a new post to the National Office team, that of a full time Research and Policy Officer. This appointment will be made and the new employee commence during 2009/10. The conversion of the former Conference Room represents a loss of a facility and creates a new office and a smaller Conference room; the new configuration will better overall meet the Association’s current and future needs.

The recommendations resulting from the 2007/08 Review of the Association conducted by the Vice President continue to provide a template for changes in the working practices for some areas of activity at National Office.

The Treasurer’s 2008/09 report on the accounts will appear elsewhere in this Annual Report but it is appropriate to comment in this section on the significant decisions made and action taken during the year in respect of the Association’s Healthcare Scheme – a trust fund scheme set up for the benefit of members and ex members in 2000 and managed on behalf of the Scheme trustees by Revelation Healthcare. The Scheme trustees, having taken independent advice from auditors concluded that the Scheme was no longer solvent and that the actions that had been taken in recent years to keep the Scheme going had been insufficient to preserve its future; Scheme membership numbers were dropping dramatically; the Scheme was not as competitively priced as in the early days; the claims and age profile of Scheme members was deteriorating. Thus the decision was made, in consultation with the Association’s trustees (a different group of trustees) and the Association’s National Executive Committee that the Scheme would be closed. This took place towards the end of the financial year with all Scheme members being offered alternative healthcare cover. The outstanding financial liabilities of the Scheme then fell on the Association and this liability is recorded in the Treasurer’s report.

NATIONAL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MEETINGS

The National Executive Committee (NEC) met, as prescribed in the Rules, six times during the year as a full Committee. The format of these meetings has now become well established whereby the ‘business’ of running and leading the Association is accompanied by the opportunity to meet with and listen to guest speakers who engage in active debate with NEC members on a wide range of topical policing issues; such guests have included Government Ministers, senior Civil Servants and ACPO lead officers.

SUPPORTING MEMBERS ‘AT RISK’

This core area of Association work led by the National Deputy Secretary, which often takes place without a high profile and unseen to many, has continued to develop and will always be a priority area of activity. The work of the Association’s Panel of Friends is reported on by the Professional Standards Co-ordinator separately in this Annual Report. The work and commitment of individual Panel members, who are prepared to support colleagues when they become ‘at risk’ is the key to the Panel’s success, and a debt of gratitude is owed to them. The work of the Panel continues to be underpinned by the services of our legal protection insurers, Abbey Legal, our solicitors, Lewis Hymanson and Small, and our Equalities Advisor, Jayne Monkhouse.

During 2008/09 new Performance and Conduct Regulations came into force (see below under PABEW). All Panel members have been trained in readiness for working with the new Regulations and the associated Statutory Guidance. We wait to see whether the hoped for impact on the timeliness and proportionality improvements that should result from the new arrangements become reality. Having been heavily involved in the development of and the implementation of the new arrangements we hope, as an Association, that this will be the case.

PRO-ACTIVE CASES

The Association has well established policies and procedures to respond to requests from members and ex-members who wish to receive support in work related pro-active action against their employer or a third party, such action not being covered by the Association’s insurance cover or by member’s Chief Constable. A Sub-Committee of the National Executive Committee has delegated powers to mange this process and during 2008/09 6 new cases were registered with the Committee and some £20,000 was spent mainly on legal advice and representation. Applications to the Committee are confidential.

One particular case over the last two years has involved not only significant financial expenditure but also a commitment by National Officers to support a (now) ex-member in an appeal against the decision of a force Selected Medical Practitioner who had concluded that the medical condition from which the officer was suffering, and had been the reason for the officer retiring from the force on the grounds of ill health, was not received in the execution of the officer’s duty. The Association considered this to be a perverse and wrong conclusion which failed to recognise the appalling treatment that the officer had received at the hands of senior force managers whilst working as a Superintendent. It was most pleasing to note that the Medical Appeal Board concluded that the permanently disabling condition suffered by the officer was caused solely by events that happened within the force and thus the officer qualified for an Injury Award. This was a landmark case for the Association.

POLICE NEGOTIATING BOARD

The Police Negotiating Board (PNB) provides the statutory national machinery for determining the pay and conditions of police officers. The Board is independently chaired and a full account of the work of the Board during 2008/09 can be found in the report of the independent Chair. This document is available at www.ome.co.uk.

During 2008/09 the work of PNB was heavily focused on negotiations on the pay of officers. The resulting three year deal for officers (2.65% from 1st Sept 08; 2.6% from 1st Sept 2009; 2.55% from 1st Sept 2010) was the first such multi-year deal for officers and the negotiations that preceded the agreement were not easy. The agreement set out ‘trigger’ mechanisms to facilitate the re-opening of the deal during the three years.

Talks on pay started early in the year and were held in the shadow of the decision of the Home Secretary not to honour in full the decision of the Police Arbitration Tribunal (PAT) in the autumn of 2007. Members of Staff Side still felt, with justification, that the Home Secretary had acted dishonourably and had let officers down; such an atmosphere is not conducive to creating an environment of trust and mutual respect when pay was back on the table. The formal challenge to the Home Secretary’s 2007 decision by way of Judicial Review was running in parallel to the 2008 pay talks as was an outstanding Staff Side claim (the Level Playing Field claim). Neither the Judicial Review challenge (result announced June 08) nor the Level Playing Field claim (result announced July 08) were successful. The Staff Side campaign for the result of a PAT award to be binding on Government continues.

At the Working Group that it was agreed should be set up, the PNB Official Side stated their desire for a multi year deal based on an index produced by the PAT in their 2007 award – a first year figure of 2.325%. This was considered and rejected by the Staff Side who in turn proposed an uplift of 3.5% based on an IDS median figure for the whole economy with effect from 1st April 2008. At subsequent meetings the Sides failed to reach agreement and a formal ‘failure to agree’ was recorded. This was the third such outcome of pay negotiations in as many years and it would again be for the PAT to resolve the issue of officer pay. This Association regretted that a ‘failure to agree’ had had to be declared as it felt that a deal had appeared to be close to agreement in July.

Once the referral to the PAT had been made the Home Office announced a formal period of consultation on proposals to disband the PNB and replace it with a Pay Review Body. Such action was no surprise as it had been strongly signalled by the Government following the recommendations contained in Part 2 of Sir Clive Booth’s Report the previous year. When the three year deal was subsequently agreed this proposal was withdrawn by the Home Office.

In the weeks immediately before the PAT hearing, scheduled for October, discussions between the Staff Side and the Official Side resulted in the three year deal outlined above being agreed. A changing economic climate and recognition of the benefits of the three year deal in terms of stability and the opportunities it presented were critical to securing agreement. This Association along with superintending rank colleagues from Scotland and Northern Ireland were content to accept the terms of the deal and welcomed it as representing the best deal that could be achieved by negotiations in the prevailing financial and political climate.

The 2003 pay agreement for Superintendents remains in force and during 2008/09 the deal was not revisited or revised. Questions about implementation by forces of the arrangements permitted under the terms of the agreement have been included in a PNB Pay Survey the results of which should be available during 2009. These results alongside outstanding matters from other PNB rank committees may make it appropriate to enter negotiations during 2009/10 with the Official Side about Superintendents’ pay.

It is appropriate for me, as PSAEW National Secretary and the Negotiating Secretary of the PNB Superintendents’ Staff Side Committee, to formally record my thanks to members of the Association’s National Executive Committee and members of the Executive Committees of the Association of Scottish Police Superintendents and the Superintendents Association of Northern Ireland for the clear, robust and realistic mandate that I was given during the 2008 pay negotiations.

Three other PNB matter should be mentioned in this report. In May 2008, the Home Secretary announced new backdated Police Pension Scheme (1987) commutation lump sum factors following a review by the Government Actuaries Dept (GAD). This backdating date was subsequently challenged by way of Judicial Review and was changed from 1st October 2007 to 1st December 2006. In the same announcement the Home Secretary launched a review of the injury benefits available to officers and the survivors of officers who die in service. The latter review is on going but Staff Side seeks to ensure that that there is no diminution in the benefits available.

In June 2008 PNB published a new agreement in respect of officers who undertake duty in a higher rank, whether ‘acting’ in that higher rank or temporarily promoted to it. The agreement sets out how officers should be compensated and how time in the higher rank should be managed. This agreement followed negotiations held over a number of years but the outcome gives clarity and consistency to what had been a problematic area affecting many Association members. It is not acceptable, however, that at the time of preparing this annual report the necessary changes to Police Regulations and Determinations have still not been made to fully bring these new arrangements into effect.

The 30+ Retention Scheme has been in existence for some nine years and during 2008/09 it was subject of review by the NPIA. It is regretted that there was no consultation with this Association or other Staff Associations prior to the publication of their report. Their recommendation to the PNB is that the Scheme should close to new members after 31st March 2010. The Association has sought to have this recommendation subject to further examination and review and a PNB Working Group has now been formed to progress this discussion. We believe that the Scheme provides a mechanism which enables and encourages some officers to remain after 30 years ensuring that the Service overall and individual forces have the appropriate skills and experience mix to meet future policing demands, one of which will be the Olympic Games in 2012.

POLICE ADVISORY BOARD OF ENGLAND AND WALES

The Police Advisory Board for England and Wales (PABEW) is able to consider matters which fall outside the prescribed remit of the Police Negotiating Board and on which advice and recommendations are made to Ministers. Much of the work undertaken by the Board concerns conditions of service and HR matters and much of the work is detailed and is thus remitted to Sub-Committees or Working Groups.  The Board is independently chaired and a full account of the work of the Board during 2008/09 can be found in the report of the independent Chair. This document is available at www.ome.co.uk.

Discussions during 2008/09 were held within PABEW on the membership of the Board itself. It was argued by some, including the Association, that the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) should become full members of the Board. The NPIA’s role and lead responsibility in many of the areas dealt with at PABEW meant that their ‘observer’ or ‘advisor’ status was not appropriate. Unfortunately this matter remains unresolved which is not a satisfactory position. The decision to open PABEW membership to the Trade Union Side of the Police Staff Council was supported and welcomed by the Association.

It is appropriate in this report to highlight the work undertaken within the PABEW since 2005 leading to the introduction on 1st December 2008 of the Police (Conduct) Regulations, the Police (Performance) Regulations and the Police Appeals Tribunal Rules. On the same date new Home Office Guidance on Police Officer Misconduct, Unsatisfactory Performance and Attendance Management Procedures came into effect. The sustained, committed and co-operative work undertaken by many individuals and a wide range of stakeholders and interested parties to reach this position should not be taken for granted or underestimated. If an example is needed of how the Service can, when working together, improve and develop then this is one to quote. The opportunity that these new procedures offer the Service, following the recommendations of the Taylor Report some years ago, must not be missed. The Association was fully involved in and supported the introduction of the new procedures.

Patrick Stayt
Chief Superintendent
National Secretary