Police funding system 'needs overhaul'

The amount of money police forces receive could be determined by the number of jobless households and bars in an area, under government proposals.

Ministers say the current police-funding model is "out of date" and have launched a consultation on using a range of factors to decide how much forces in England and Wales receive.

These could include population size and the physical aspects of a force's area.

The justice minister said the plans would make police funding fairer.

The funding consultation will look at how best to replace the Police Allocation Formula (PAF), which has been used for nearly 10 years.

Currently the PAF does not calculate what police forces need individually.

'Fairest possible way'

Under the proposals, funding would take into account five features of local areas including:

• Population

• The number of council tax band D or equivalent properties in the area, because of the contributions to police from council tax

• The number of households with no working adult and dependent children

• A "hard-pressed" population indicator, which covers a wide range of types of households

• The number of bars per hectare

Under the system, central funding for policing would be divided according to the weighting of each indicator, then allocated to each force depending on their "score" for each of the factors.

The consultation document says the third and fourth elements are "two socio-economic factors that are closely correlated with the patterns of crime seen between different areas over time".

It adds: "The government feels that these two factors are sufficiently representative of the differences between forces.

"They are highly correlated with other demographic and socio-economic factors that were considered."

'Robust and transparent'

Justice Minister Mike Penning said police funding needed to change

Justice Minister Mike Penning said the reforms would put police funding "on a long-term, sustainable footing".

He said: "The current model for allocating police funding is complex, opaque and out-of-date. This consultation sets out proposals to deliver a police-funding model for the future which is fair, robust and transparent."

A spokesperson for the Home Office said it wanted to bring in the new formula "as soon as it was appropriate" and was seeking views on what "transitional arrangements" would be needed if it was implemented in the next financial year.

Further work will be carried out to refine the model before it is introduced.

The proposed overhaul comes amid debate over how the police service should be organised in the face of reduced resources from government.

Last month, the National Audit Office warned the government had "insufficient information" on how much further police funding could be cut without "degrading services".