Police pay

The Herald reports:

Frontline police staff will not have their pay cut in talks due to resume this week, but are facing a pay freeze because of a tight policing budget.

Police Commissioner Peter Marshall could not confirm yesterday whether sworn police officers would get a raise in pay negotiations which are being held with unions.

I do wish the full facts would be presented. The Police Commissioner can not just refuse a pay raise. He can make an offer, which the union can accept or reject. The union can make a claim, which the Commissioner can accept or reject. If they can not agree, their the final offer and claim go to a three person independent arbitration panel, which will decide to either accept the Commissioner’s offer in its totality or the union’s claim in its totality.

Police have predicted that a 3 per cent wage increase would cost $75 million a year and CSI increases would cost $42.5 million a year.

That’s a strange figure. If a 3% wage increase would cost $75 million a year, then that means the current wage bill is $2.5b a year.  As their total operating costs are $1.48b a year, that figure must be wrong.

Also with 9,000 Police officers a claim that a 3% wage increase would cost $75m a year means each officer would get a pay rise of $8,300 or so. For that to be 3%, it means the average pay rate would be $275,000 a year approx.