Monday 14^th December 2009

Dear Mr Old,

FOI Reference No: FOI-20091/101807

Thank you for your request for information dated 13^th November 2009 and listed below.

Part 9 of Annex "F" (a Determination for Regulation 24 of the Police Regulations 2003) sets out the procedure for the payment of Competence-Related Threshold Payment ("CRTP") to police officers up to the rank of chief inspector. Paragraphs 1 to 6 set out the entitlement for this payment, and paragraphs 7, 8 and 9 set out the circumstances in which payment may be ceased, i.e. re-assessment due to concerns with respect to the maintenance of high professional standards by a member in receipt of the payment, promotion to a higher rank, and temporary promotion to a higher rank, respectively.

There are *no* provisions in the Determination, or under any other statute, that make it lawful for payment of CRTP to be ceased whilst a member of a police force is in receipt of temporary salary under Regulation 27(a) and Annex "I", i.e. the member has been required to perform the duties normally performed by a member of the force of a higher rank than his own ("acting-up").

As a consequence of some forces failing to comply with Regulations as described, agreement of both sides in PNB of the correct interpretation (as set out in PNB Circular 4/2008) led to the issue of Home Office Circular 18/2008 in which forces were advised that paragraph 14 of the PNB Circular ("Officers who are on acting up should receive their CRTP") "*will* take effect from the 1st July 2008" (my emphasis).

I seek to establish:

(1) whether or not your force complies with Home Office Circular 18/2008 and Police Regulations and Determinations as described above, by continuing to pay CRTP to a member who, having been awarded CRTP, is in receipt of temporary salary (NB - "acting up", NOT temporarily promoted to a higher rank under Regulation 27(b) and Annex "J").

If you do not so comply:

(2) please advise by what legal authority your force ceases making such payments; and

(3) please advise what action you take when an inspector, on pay point 3 (top rate) and in receipt of CRTP, is required to perform the duties of a chief inspector, whose pay is less than that of such an officer. NB - the exception set out in paragraph 9 of Part 9 of Annex "F" *DOES NOT APPLY* to temporary salary - it applies only to temporary promotion under Regulation 27(b).

West Yorkshire Police do comply with the Home Office Circular 18/2008 as referred to above, and therefore questions 2 and 3 do not apply.

Please accept our apologies for the delay in responding to your request. This is due to a large volume of Freedom of Information requests that are currently being dealt with by West Yorkshire Police.

Police forces providing information do not use generic systems, nor are the procedures used for capturing the data the same. It should be noted that for these reasons this forces response to your questions should not be used for comparison purposes with any other response you may receive.

COMPLAINT RIGHTS

If you are not satisfied with how this request has been handled or with the information provided, please read the advice notice attached to this letter. If you do wish to take up your right of complaint, please remember to quote the reference number above in any future correspondence.

Yours sincerely

Laura Mudd

Freedom of Information Project Officer

pp

Steven Harding

Head of Information Management

The West Yorkshire Police in complying with their statutory duty under sections 1 and 11 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to release the enclosed information will not breach the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. However, the rights of the copyright owner of the enclosed information will continue to be protected by law.  Applications for the copyright owner's written permission to reproduce any part of the attached information should be addressed to The Force Solicitor, West Yorkshire Police Headquarters, PO Box 9, Laburnum Road, Wakefield WF1 3QP.