Police Federation members to be given vote on industrial rights

21 June 2023

The Police Federation is to ask its members if they want the organisation to  pursue industrial rights on their behalf.

The historic decision to hold a ballot on the issue was taken by the National Council, the members of which will now begin the process of exploring what industrial rights could mean for members.

West Midlands Police Federation chair Rich Cooke said: “This is a positive decision to address the disgraceful way our members are currently being treated over pay. 

“Police officers have no bargaining rights and no industrial rights and pay has been in decline for more than 20 years as a result.

“Our members have seen their pay fall by 20 per cent over the last two decades - even more among junior ranks who have been disproportionately affected - and that is utterly unacceptable, particularly when we are currently denied even the opportunity to negotiate our pay.

“We have called for a 17 per cent settlement this year and we wanted to make sure our members were balloted on seeking industrial rights either before the pay announcement was made this summer or urgently afterwards.

“We need to get on with it and make it count. We’re not there yet.”

The ballot motion was proposed by the West Midlands Region and backed by the Metropolitan Branch.

West Midlands branch secretary Tim Rogers said: “We wanted to make sure our members were given the ability to direct the Police Federation on how it acts for them on the wholly important issue of pay and conditions.

“We are delighted that other branch boards around England and Wales have overwhelmingly supported the proposal.

“We have been forced to think the once unthinkable because of the inappropriate pay award mechanism which has delivered year after year of real pay reductions.

“Police are virtually unique in being legally barred from industrial action at the same time as having no bargaining rights whatsoever.

“There is a simple solution: give police a genuine ‘seat at the table’ and an arbitration system we can trust.”

The police service gave up its recourse to industrial action to settle disputes more than 100 years ago.

The country was thrown into turmoil between 1918 and 1919 when more than 50,000 police officers under the guidance of the National Union of Police and Prison Officers (NUPPO) went on strike after repeated calls for fair pay and work conditions in the wake of the First World War.

Eventually the government of the day backed down and promised fair pay to police officers in return for them giving up the right to strike and brought in the Police Act 1919, which also established by law the Police Federation of England and Wales.

But independent research published by the Social Market Foundation (SMF) think tank earlier this suggested the well-documented decline in police pay over the last two decades is likely to be linked to the restrictions on police officers’ right to strike, which it says has put them at a distinct disadvantage to all other key workers when it comes to pay talks.