Police (Pay) (Hansard, 18 February 1971)

§ 25. Mr. Fernyhough
asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will ask the Police Council to give special payment for overtime and shift allowances in the police force which are matters causing concern to the police.

§ Mr. Sharples
Overtime already attracts either additional time off or payment at special rates. Shift work has been taken into account in the basic rates of police pay since 1960.

§ Mr. Fernyhough
Does the hon. Gentleman appreciate that his answer will be very unsatisfactory to the vast majority of the police force who feel in the same position as the postmen since their legitimate pay claim is being held up to satisfy the ideology of the Government? Does he not realise that, unless there is a better shift allowance and better overtime payments, more resignations are likely to take place and there will be less recruitment.

§ Mr. Sharples
I find it difficult to understand the right hon. Gentleman's question, because if on this matter there were concern in the service the Staff Side would have expressed that concern in the Police Council. In fact, the Staff Side has not done so.

§ Mr. Fowler
Has my hon. Friend considered the desirability of consolidating rent allowance in the pay since the rent allowance in London amounts to as much as £8 a week? That would be a true picture of the policemen's pay and might act an an inducement to recruitment?

§ Mr. Sharples
This is a matter for general consideration by the Police Council, which they might take into account in the present negotiations.

§ Mr. Bagier
Would the Minister accept that when one talks to individual policemen one factor they raise is that their collective wage includes emoluments, and so forth, and that the average sum amounts to a completely unsatisfactory figure? Would he agree that although the recruitment figures announced a little earlier by his right hon. Friend appear to be satisfactory, the number of resignation from the force by experienced officers is a very serious factor?

§ Mr. Sharples
If the police feel that this is a matter which they wish to discuss, the right course is for the representatives of the police to bring it forward in the Police Council. That is the right place for such details to be discussed.