Chair's message: April - May 2018

31 May 2018

Double monthly update – April and May 2018

Busy, busy, busy….

Like yourselves, your Federation has been busy these past few weeks, hence no updated last month. Building on the forming of your new council, your Board has been formed, made up of 12 elected fed reps looking to lead across fourteen different areas. For a detailed breakdown of whose who, members can take a look on the force Intranet at our ConEXtions page under ‘do you need a Fed Rep?’.

Conference

This year we took 10 fed reps to conference up in Birmingham. We heard from a number of interesting speakers, not least of which was Savid Javid MP the new Home Secretary. His was an accomplished speech, striking the balance between humour and serious matters in hand. What he brings is a fresh approach and we were cautiously encouraged by his speech. He offered to personally intervene in cases where spit guards are not being issued and made it clear he didn’t think a great deal of Chiefs using ‘public perception’ as a reason not to adequately equip their officers for the tough roles we perform. Thankfully our Chief moved away from this view months ago. The Home Secretary also promised to listen and work with the Federation, potentially ushering in a new more constructive relationship.

Other interesting speakers where the new Director General of the IOPC, who admitted his organisation has some way to go to improve the operational reputation and credibility of his organisation with our members. He perhaps didn’t help improve this relationship by offering us a challenge – to help reduce the amount of time it takes to conclude investigations by your ignoring the advice of solicitors and being more talkative with his investigators… the federation vote award nil points!!

Useful inputs on women in policing, fatigue in the work place, police pay and conditions and federation reform also informed the delegates. We were lucky enough to be joined at conference by our Chief Mr KAVANAGHER and PFCC Mr HIRST.

Politics

I have met with James CLEVERLEY MP in a constructive meeting following which he has agreed to write to the Home Secretary on our behalf, highlighting the benefit to a change in Legislation around police drivers and ‘Protect the Protectors’. Both of these changes will have such a minimal impact on the wider population, which is one of the reasons it’s difficult to get politicians on board, but with his service background in the TA, Mr CLEVERLEY was able to appreciate the positive impact the changes would have on the moral and good will of our service. His letter to the Home Secretary will point out the impact the changes are likely to have on our colleagues against the lack of impact anywhere else, making them a powerful statement for government support of our police service. I will let you know what results from the letter.

I am due to meet Giles WATLING MP for Clacton later this month and will be looking for the same kind of support, and also starting to lobby our Essex Lords as the Protect the Protector legislation makes its way through the second chamber. This is the private members bill from Chris BRYANT MP which looks to make assaulting emergency service works an aggravating factor. It was been changed and amended on its way through parliament, with an additional 12 months penalty being agreed on rather than the 24 asked for – or the 60 months proposed sentence for animal cruelty!! Parallels around how much parliament appears to value officers having been drawn to the plight of an abused house pet – serious though animal cruelty is. The spitting element has also been diluted following lobbing by AIDS/HIV charities, but the bill is still moving forward.

Likewise, the Police Driver changes are moving forwards too, with the government looking to take this forward as their own legislation. They are putting the matter out to public consultation and we wait to see how that plays out.

Compensatory rest

The Chief has signed ‘comp rest’ into the Working Time Directive Work Based Agreement for the next two years. We have been pushing for this for a while and really welcome its arrival. Comp rest is a reflection of the organisations positive duty to secure the appropriate amount of rest for officers, notwithstanding operational requirements.

As most of you probably know Police Regs mean the organisation cannot roster you to work with less than 11 hours between duties, but operationally you can work whatever the job needs to get it done in the right circumstances. If you end up working into that 11 hour period before the start of a rostered duty, the job has a duty to help you get that time back somehow.

Here are some examples of how comp rest works..

Rostered to work Mon - 0800-1700 followed by Tues – 0800-1700. Actually work Mon – 0800-0300 as dealing with a prisoner. Working and claiming 9 hours OT.  

Comp rest period would be applicable for the 11 hours prior to starting Tues at 0800. This would be 2100 – 0800. Finishing at 0300 means 6 hours Comp Rest accrued having worked on Mon into this period 2100-0300.

Firstly, I would not want to encourage officers into thinking it was up to them if the rest could be taken immediately or not. Operational cohesion must take precedence, so if, and only if, a supervisor has agreed that the rest can be taken there and then, should officers be reporting for duty accordingly.

Example One :  Having worked the OT on Mon but prior to Tues – 0800 the officer has conversation with a Supervisor and its agreed the officer can come in and start at 1400 on Tuesday, finishing on time at 1700. No need to claim Comp Rest as taken straight away. Retrospective email to RMU to reflect duties correctly, and if late off over due on Tues then O/T starts from 1700.

Secondly, the organisation has a duty under working time regs to encourage and support colleagues to get the right amount of rest.

Example Two : Officer can’t get comp rest authorised prior to 0800 so must come in but is allowed off at 1100 on Tuesday by a supervisor, taking the last 6 hours of that shift as Comp rest. E-mail to RMU to reflect this Tues 0800-1100 then 1100-1700 as Comp rest.

Finally, if operationally it’s not possible to take the Comp rest straight away, it must be banked. The organisation still has this duty to encourage the right amount of rest and the officer doesn’t want to feel taken advantage of by the supervisor not allowing the rest straight away, so these 6 hours are banked. They have no monetary value so they won’t expire like other types of leave can nor will they be converted to pay, but the officer should be encouraged to take the leave at the next convenient time for both them and the organisation.

Example Three : Officers can’t get Comp rest authorised so comes in at 0800 and is needed for a full days duty. Officer submits a claim for 6 hours Comp Rest. This then sits in their SAP pot as FHIL, but MUST be used as first point of call for next leave booked. When this is booked/taken, RMU e-mailed to reflect on SAP.

To recap:

• Comp Rest is not taken in lieu of OT, both can be claimed if applicable.
• Only if a supervisor agrees can it be taken straight away
• If not possible to take straight away it can be banked
• Must be used at the next leave opportunity before any other leave pots used.

And finally,

We hope you have started to see our PIP education video in your officer safety training. We are really pleased with how this turned out and welcome your feedback on it, particularly if you knew nothing about PIP before seeing it…