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Pension cutbacks rebound on police budgets
David Crompton
Police face huge compensation bills after unlawfully cutting the pensions of some retired officers in a bid to save money, with Yorkshire’s largest force expected to be the most severely affected in the country.
West Yorkshire Police has already settled, at a cost of tens of thousands of pounds, with four officers who were forced to retire after being injured on duty and later had their pensions reduced.
Campaigners believe the deal could open the floodgates for hundreds of other retired officers to claim back money, piling more pressure on forces already confronted with deep budget cuts.
It affects police authorities, including West Yorkshire and North Yorkshire, who have adopted controversial Home Office guidance encouraging them to slash spending on injury pensions.
The four retired West Yorkshire officers took their former police authority to court, claiming it was wrong to cut their payments after they had reached the age of 65.
A judge sitting at the Administrative Court in Leeds gave them permission to seek a judicial review, but the authority agreed to settle before the case could be heard.
One retired officer, former sergeant Dennis Clarkson, said: “I was injured while serving my community and lost my career and my income as a result.
“I was appalled that my police authority, like other police authorities the length and breadth of the nation, has used unlawful guidance from the Home Office to reduce the pensions of former serving officers. I hope that other former officers and police authorities sit up and take notice.”
Ron Thompson, a York-based solicitor who represented the retired officers, said he had seen cases where claimants’ incomes had been cut by more than £10,000 a year.
“Police authorities should be contacting all the pensioners they have reviewed in this manner and see if they want to sort it out,” he added. “There will be hundreds, if not thousands, of injured ex-officers in this country who have had their pensions reduced unlawfully.”
The Home Office guidance was introduced in 2004 in an attempt to standardise the injury pension process, but fewer than half of the 43 forces in England and Wales have adopted it and each has interpreted it differently.
Clint Elliott, chief executive of the National Association of Retired Police Officers, said it had received more complaints about injury pension reviews in West Yorkshire than anywhere else in the country.
He added: “We have been writing to the police authority and the Chief Constable on this subject for three or four years, pointing out that they were wrong. If they had listened four years ago they would not be in the position they are now. This must have cost a fortune. What originally was meant to be a money-saving venture is going to blow up in their faces.”
West Yorkshire Deputy Chief Constable David Crompton said the guidance meant “some very difficult and emotive choices” had to be made.
“Nevertheless we do not believe that this court ruling represents a precedent which will result in a wide ranging review of all these cases and in the context of the force having to save over £100m in the next four years we believe that the taxpayers will understand our approach,” he said.
A North Yorkshire Police spokesman said it had reviewed the entitlements of a “small number” of over-65s in the past but had halted reviews to wait for revised guidance from the Home Office, due next year.
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Comments
There are 4 comments to this article
Page 1 of 1
manouche
Saturday, December 3, 2011 at 10:18 PMDCC COMPTON's comments are, as expected, expedient and political. What the public should be told is that, prior to 2006, the pensions of former police officers who were permanently disabled as a result of injuries sustained in the execution of their police duties whilst serving their communities, were met from the Police Pensions Scheme which was funded by the contributions of their still serving colleagues. From 2006 onwards this position changed as a result of the Finance Act 2004. Following the introduction of the 2004 Act the injury pensions of disabled former officers fell to be met from the operating budgets of police forces. Almost immediately, albeit on flawed advice from the Home Office, DCC COMPTON's force, and a minority of others in England & Wales, including North Yorkshire, without any thought for the financial consequences for disabled former officers and their families sought to reduce the effect of the change on their budgets. As a first step they automatically reduced the injury pensions of those disabled former officers to the lowest level simply because they had then attained the age of 65 years. Both the Administrative Court and the Pensions Ombudsman have said that such an automatic reduction is unlawful yet DCC COMPTON appears to refuse to accept that this is the case and to take action to restore the reduced injury pensions to their correct level and to compensate those who have been unlawfully treated. Shame on you Mr COMPTON and West Yorkshire Police Authority. And shame on all those police authorities and police forces who have acted. and who continue to act in the same way and resist quickly putting matters right.
nanie
Friday, December 2, 2011 at 05:13 PMWYP, you are an utter disgrace. Mr Crompton, you are a Turncoat. To home in on the pensions of officers injured in the course of their duty, at a time in their life when they have virtually no means of making up the lost money, is about as low as you can get. Shame on you.
AnAhlltellthithatfernowt
Friday, December 2, 2011 at 02:23 PMMr Crompton doesn't seem to realise that the game is up. The Force has trampled over the law of the land and in the course of doing so has brought misery to over 200 disabled former officers whose injury pensions were cut. The decision not to contest the case ensured that the full details of the Force's unlawful conduct, and its cost in human and financial terms, was not made public. Surely it is time that a full enquiry was made into this fiasco? Those responsible should be disciplined. Mr Crompton seeks to muddy the waters by alluding to budget cuts and claiming that public sympathy will be on his side. He is wrong. If the public knew the full facts of the outrageous waste of public money there would be calls for his resignation. West Yorkshire spent taxpayers hard earned brass on pointless and unlawful reviews of police injury pensions and are now having to spend more in order to reinstate the correct level of those pensions. Police injury pensions are set by legislation, and West Yorkshire Police has broken the law by reducing pensions. They were encouraged to do so by guidance from the Home Office. That guidance was very obviously bad advice, for the majority of forces in England and Wales chose to ignore it and detailed research has revealed the depths of the lies it contains. That research, and other documents exposing the Great Pensions Robbery are now in the public domain and can be read and downloaded from.scribd.comwdtk Do the decent thing Mr. Crompton, hand in your handcuffs and truncheon - resign and think yourself lucky to escape with a pension so large that it will keep you in luxury for the rest of your life.
neilwilby
Friday, December 2, 2011 at 11:17 AMYet another management blunder by West Yorkshire Police that costs the taxpayer tens of thousands of pounds. What is not stated is the huge amount that the police will have also spent on legal fees. Their incompetence and cavalier approach to the law of the land is mind-boggling.
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