Tough year for PSNI ends with stark warning from Police Federation

At the end of what has been a particularly challenging year for the Police Service of Northern Ireland, Liam Kelly accused the NI Secretary of treating officers with “disrespect”.Mr Kelly said rank and file PSNI officers “are effectively pawns” in a political controversy – with a police pay award being withheld as a “bargaining chip” as pressure mounts on the DUP to restore the powersharing executive at Stormont.

During the course of 2023, the PSNI was rocked by the attempted murder of DCI John Caldwell in Omagh, the outcome of a judicial review that found two officers in south Belfast had been unlawfully disciplined, an unprecedented data breach and the resignation of the chief constable Simon Byrne.

Mr Kelly said the start of 2024 “will bring little or no relief for police officers weighed down by the burden of severe resourcing deficiencies and financial constraints”.

Mr Kelly said the NI Secretary was being “obstinate” in the face of call to bring financial relief to police, and other public sector workers.

“For the Secretary of State to positively intervene on pay awards would see the removal of a bargaining chip in the endless discussions over the Windsor Framework and the Northern Ireland budget. So, the officers I represent are effectively pawns in this political controversy, this logjam that is not of their making,” he said.

“This is a cheap and shoddy strategy that does no one any credit and it must end. All it does is feed cynicism. It is appalling treatment of the men and women I represent who risk life and limb on behalf of all our communities.

“Our officers are incredibly resourceful and resilient, but even their recognised ability to do more with less has been stretched to breaking point.

"They are fatigued, grappling with constant pressures, attacked and abused, under-valued and treated with disrespect by a government that certainly doesn’t appear to have their backs.”

Mr Kelly said around 60 officers are leaving or retiring every month, and added: “This is an unprecedented exodus and shows no sign of slowing downor being reversed.

"There are still three months to go before the end of the financial year and I expect the headcount total number of officers to dip to a frightening and unsustainable newlow of around 6,300. There is an obvious need for urgent intervention...this is all uncharted territory for policing”.

In a New Year statement, Mr Kelly went on to say: “The Service is being slowly strangled by a government that is using policing, and other cash-strapped public services, as a political bargaining chip to re-start the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly which has been ‘moth-balled’ for almost two years. The tactic is to heap pressure on the DUP to end its boycott of the institutions and, so far, it has proved fruitless and unproductive”.

Mr Kelly also said that a return to Stormont, without “sustainable financial muscle from HM Treasury” will only provide a short-term sticking plaster – not the much-needed “transformational long-term solutions”.

He added: “Our society needs to see the PSNI getting the significant investment it requires as a matter of urgency.”