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Staffing

PCSOs on the beat

When the Government began its Comprehensive Spending Review in 2010, most public sector organisations saw considerable reductions in their annual budgets, and policing was no exception. Cuts to police funding will always take a toll on the number of police officers and staff available to prevent crime and protect the public.

Humberside Police receives around 70% of its total funding from Central Government, the other 30% comes from the policing precept you pay as part of your annual Council Tax bill. Around 80% of the total budget is spent on staff, so you can see that when Government make the level of cuts we saw in recent years, and all other options to save money have been explored, the only thing the police can do to balance the books is to reduce staff. 

Police Officers cannot be made redundant, so from 2010 to 2016/17, as they left or retired, the majority were not replaced. Some Police Support Staff, which includes frontline posts like PCSO's, Investigation Officers and Custody Staff, were able to take voluntary redundancy, others left and the majority were not replaced.

The charts below show the numbers of police officers and staff employed by Humberside Police since 2010. From the start of the comprehensive spending review until 2016 the force lost over a quarter of its workforce. PCSO's, who do vital work in communities, also saw their numbers reduced by around 25%.

It's quite obvious that with such a reduction in staff numbers, Humberside Police could not deliver the level of service and protection it used to. The Police and Crime Commissioner worked with the Chief Constable to make the best use of financial resources available which has enabled the force to boost police officer numbers, resulting in the biggest recruitment of new police officers in Humberside Police’s history, many of whom made the step from PCSO or Special Constables to become regular officers, and by February 2021 police officer numbers were back to where they were in 2010. The Commissioner released financial reserves and applied the maximum precept increase permitted to fund extra police officers for all communities across the Force area. 


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Staff Data 2022