Thousands of police officers are receiving nearly £250m in full pay for doing part-time or restricted work after being sick or injured.
Data from 47 British forces released under freedom of information legislation showed that 8,167 officers out of more than 160,000 were on recuperative or limited duties for one day last September.
The estimated salary bill was £665,000 for one day, based on an average officer’s salary of £30,000 a year, and amounting to £245m per annum, reports the Times.
Under current legislation, sick or injured officers can spend up to a year on recuperative duties after examination by doctors. The officers may return to work, gradually increasing their number of hours, but they may be put on restricted duties.
Suffolk was found to have the highest proportion of officers on restrictive or recuperative duties, at 9.4%.
A spokesman for the National Police Federation said: “The extraordinary nature of the work that police officers do means that, unlike other professions, they are putting themselves in potentially conflicting situations on a daily basis.”
