Police Injury Pensions

The request was successful.

Dear North Yorkshire Police,

I am making a request for information concerning the administration of police injury pensions.

When an injury pension is first granted (under Article 11 of the Police (Injury Benefit) Regulations 2006), or when an injury pension is reviewed (under Article 37-(1) of the Police (Injury Benefit) Regulations 2006) a Selected Medical Practitioner (SMP) is required to decide the degree of disablement, or any alteration in degree of disablement, as appropriate.

The Regulations do not set out the method the SMP should use. However, the Home Office provided guidance in Part 5 of Guidance On Medical Appeals Under The Police Pensions Regulations 1987 And The Police (Injury Benefit) Regulations 2006.

That guidance states, in Paragraph 9, 'The Regulations do not set out a specified procedure for assessing the degree of a person's disablement. The Administrative Court has, however, commented that the task in assessing earning capacity is to assess what the person is capable of doing and thus capable of earning. It is not a labour market assessment of whether somebody would actually pay that person to do what he or she is capable of doing, whether or not in competition with other workers. What follows here is the procedure suggested by the Home Office. This has no binding authority but it is the procedure which has been followed in most forces and by boards over recent years.'

I am requesting any documents that record whether or not your force SMP has at any time followed the procedure that is set out in the guidance.

If there are multiple documents, then, in order to keep this request as simple as possible, you may provide a list allowing ready identification of those documents together with a 'Yes' or 'No' answer to the question, 'Did your force SMP at any time follow the procedure set out in the Home Office Guidance On Medical Appeals Under The Police Pensions Regulations 1987 And The Police (Injury Benefit) Regulations 2006?'

If the answer is yes, or if you provide a document or documents that indicate the answer would be yes, then will you also inform me when this procedure was first brought into operation.

Yours faithfully,

John Jarman

Civil Disclosure,

Thank you for your e-mail directed to the North Yorkshire Police Civil
Disclosure Unit (formerly Information Law). The mailbox is monitored
only during office hours which are 0830 - 1700 Monday - Thursday, 0830 -
1630 Friday. Your e-mail will be retrieved and logged during office
hours and then receive attention by a member of the team as soon as
practicable.

This auto-response should not be taken as formal acknowledgement of
receipt, which will be issued if appropriate by the team member
allocated to deal with the correspondence in question.

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Civil Disclosure,

1 Attachment

Classification: PROTECT

Mr Jarman

I write in connection with your request for information which was
received by North Yorkshire Police on 29 January 2012, as detailed
below.

Your request will now be considered in accordance with the Freedom of
Information Act 2000 (the Act). You will receive a response within the
statutory timescale of 20 working days as defined by the Act, subject to
the information not being exempt or containing a reference to a third
party. In some circumstances North Yorkshire Police may be unable to
achieve this deadline. If this is likely you will be informed and given
a revised time-scale at the earliest opportunity.

There may be a fee payable for the retrieval, collation and provision of
the information you request. If this is the case you will be informed
and the 20 working day timescale will be suspended until we receive
payment from you. If you choose not to make payment then your request
will remain unanswered.

Some requests may also require either full or partial transference to
another public authority in order to answer your query in the fullest
possible way. Again, you will be informed if this is the case.

Your attention is drawn to the attached sheet which details your right
of complaint.

Should you have any queries concerning this matter, please write quoting
the reference number 644.2012.

Yours sincerely

Gail Paylor
Disclosure Assistant
Legal and Compliance Service Directorate North Yorkshire Police Police
Headquarters, Newby Wiske Hall, Northallerton, DL7 9HA External Callers
- Telephone 101

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Dear North Yorkshire Police
Civil Disclosure,

Please note that I have not received your response within the statutory 20 working day limit.

You are in breach of the FOI Act.

Would you therefore either provide your response without further delay or let me know when I can expect your response.

Yours sincerely,

John Jarman

Civil Disclosure,

Thank you for your e-mail directed to the North Yorkshire Police Civil
Disclosure Unit (formerly Information Law). The mailbox is monitored
only during office hours which are 0830 - 1700 Monday - Thursday, 0830 -
1630 Friday. Your e-mail will be retrieved and logged during office
hours and then receive attention by a member of the team as soon as
practicable.

This auto-response should not be taken as formal acknowledgement of
receipt, which will be issued if appropriate by the team member
allocated to deal with the correspondence in question.

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Civil Disclosure,

Classification: PROTECT

Mr Jarman

I apologise that you have not yet received a response to your FOI query,
which is now overdue. We have recently experienced a high volume of
requests and this unfortunately has effected our response times. I have
informed the Legal Officer dealing with your request that you have
chased it today. Please be assured that your request is now receiving
priority attention. Hopefully a response will be sent out in the near
future however I'm afraid I can not be specific regarding time scales.

Many Thanks

Gail Paylor
Disclosure Assistant
Legal and Compliance Service Directorate North Yorkshire Police Police
Headquarters, Newby Wiske Hall, Northallerton, DL7 9HA External Callers
- Telephone 101

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John Jarman left an annotation ()

Anyone who has an interest in, or a concern with, the maladministration of injury pensions by some forces and police authorities can find further information via these links:

PIPIN – a web site for disabled former officers
http://www.pipin.org.uk/

SCRIBD – a collection of documents relating to police injury pensions, including results of research conducted via Freedom of Information Act requests
http://www.scribd.com/wdtk

Pension.pen.io – a web site containing practical advice for former officers on injury pensions
http://www.injurypension.pen.io/

An article on Home Office Circular 46/2004 can be seen on Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_Office...

Dear North Yorkshire Police,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of North Yorkshire Police's handling of my FOI request 'Police Injury Pensions'.

Your response is now excessively overdue and you are in breach of the Freedom of Information Act. Unless I receive an acknowledgement within four working days, in which you can advise me when you will be providing your substantive response to my request I will have no option but to report the matter to the Information Commissioner.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address:
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/po...

Yours faithfully,

John Jarman

Civil Disclosure,

Thank you for your e-mail directed to the North Yorkshire Police Civil
Disclosure Unit (formerly Information Law). The mailbox is monitored
only during office hours which are 0830 - 1700 Monday - Thursday, 0830 -
1630 Friday. Your e-mail will be retrieved and logged during office
hours and then receive attention by a member of the team as soon as
practicable.

This auto-response should not be taken as formal acknowledgement of
receipt, which will be issued if appropriate by the team member
allocated to deal with the correspondence in question.

show quoted sections

Civil Disclosure,

Classification: NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED

Mr Jarman

I apologise for the length of delay in responding to your request, we
are currently awaiting receipt of information from another business area
in the force, please be assured that we will now endeavour to expedite
this request.

Many thanks
Jo James
Disclosure Manager
Legal and Compliance Services Directorate North Yorkshire Police Police
Headquarters Newby Wiske Hall Northallerton DL7 9HA Telephone 101

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Williams, Helen,

1 Attachment

Classification: NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED

Dear Mr Jarman

 

Please find attached response to your Freedom of Information Act request.
Please accept our apologies for the delay in responding.

 

Yours sincerely

 

Helen Williams
Legal Officer (Civil Disclosure)
Legal & Compliance Services Directorate
North Yorkshire Police HQ
Newby Wiske Hall
Newby Wiske
Northallerton
North Yorkshire
DL7 9HA
External Callers - Telephone 101

 

644.2012 response.pdf
NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED

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