Police chief's expenses published

THE expenses claims of Norfolk police's top brass have been published online and the force plans to extend this to other senior members of staff in the near future.

Claims submitted by all Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) ranks - the chief constable, his deputy and assistants and the force's assistant chief officer - have been uploaded and show travel, accommodation and hospitality claims over the past year.

It is not possible to establish specifically what the money was spent on, but the forms do detail the date, place and purpose of each claim.

The force says: “Information about locations and functions/events has been excluded in the interests of the personal safety of the chief officer and colleagues.”

The claims do not include details of chief officers' remuneration pack-ages, but many of these are already in the public domain following various Freedom of Information Act requests for, for example, details of bonus payments and company cars.

The newly published documents show that chief constable Ian McPherson claimed a total of �3,700 on Norfolk police business and �1,200 on ACPO duties.

The biggest single claim was �915 for a conference in Boston, USA, last month. The biggest single claim for hospitality was �207 at a conference in Lancashire last year; the smallest was a �1 claim in London in January.

Deputy chief constable Ian Lear-month claimed a total of �2,200, assistant chief constable Kevin Wilkins claimed �1,224, assistant chief constable Simon Bailey claimed �203, and assistant chief officer (resources) Rupert Birtles claimed �188.

Since the end of the financial year, a third assistant chief constable, Charlie Hall, responsible for human resources, has been appointed.

Police authority chief executive Chris Harding said the force was looking to extend the publication of expenses to senior police authority staff and ACPO-grade civilians.