North police to make 25 civilian staff redundant

balancing books will also see freeze on new officers

Published:

Northern Constabulary will have to make about 25 civilian backroom staff redundant and stop recruiting police officers to achieve a 4% cut in their expected budget for 2010/11.

The Northern Joint Police Board was told yesterday that the total revenue budget available for the coming year will be set at £59.1million, which represents a standstill budget.

But, because of rising costs, a cut in expenditure to balance the budget is needed.

Chief Constable Ian Latimer said that he had kept the budget for the current year tight because of dire warnings about the impending public expenditure cuts.

He said: “The number of police officers is currently 807, and we had planned to recruit more to get a total of 823 officers.

“We have stopped recruitment because we are facing a challenging year and, if we can achieve the planned efficiencies, we will cap officer numbers at 800.

“We have a budget underspend this year of about £708,000 and we are pressing for a reimbursement on pensions of £429,000, but this will be linked to 25 redundancies we are seeking as part of the savings programme.”

Board convener councillor Norman MacLeod said: “There have been huge reductions in financial settlements, but we will not be permitted to go into deficit. This is only the start of our difficulties, and it will be the same for every public agency in the UK.”

Mr Latimer added: “The requisitions from our constituent local authorities will be at a standstill, or less in some cases. In cash terms, it will be £600,000 less than we asked for this year. That is difficult because we are in the middle of multi-year pay deals, and we are committed to annual salary increments.

“We have increased utility costs, procurement costs and transport costs. We would need an increase of about 5.8% just to stand still in real terms. We need a 4% cut in expenditure to balance the budget, and, as 83% of our budget is spent on people, savings will come from cuts in police support staff.”

Mr Latimer said they had not recruited this autumn because there was no mechanism for making officers redundant, and fewer officers were retiring because there were no alternative jobs.

He said: “Our support staff are loyal and committed people, and we have had two meetings already. About 40 have expressed an interest in voluntary redundancy, but we need to remove 25 to get to the starting point for the 2010/11 budget. But some are specialist skills we can’t afford to lose, so some will be refused voluntary redundancy.”