The Independent Review Panel is today publishing the second of its two reports following the Employment Tribunal judgment on the Federation’s handling of the police pensions challenge in 2023.
The first phase report (was published in November 2024 and focused on looking back at the governance and leadership failings that led to the judgment. The second phase report looks forward and makes strategic recommendations around the future of the Federation. The recommendations focus on three key areas: (i) campaigning; (ii) culture and (iii) governance. The full list of recommendations is below.
Mukund Krishna, CEO of the Police Federation of England and Wales, said: “We are grateful to the panel for their time and effort engaging with so many members, former members and interested parties right across England and Wales. We welcome the report and will take time to study the recommendations in detail and discuss them with key stakeholders inside and outside our organisation. This report, together with the looking back review, will play an important role in shaping the future of the Federation.”
The Federation will now enter a period of engagement on the recommendations from both phase one and two of the report with a view to publishing a transformation plan over the summer.
The panel’s recommendations
A more effective campaigning organisation:
1. The communications function of the Federation should be radically overhauled to enable it to articulate and advocate effectively on the issues of concern to its membership, their aspirations for better working lives and better terms and conditions for the membership.
2. The Federation should provide professional support for branches and reps through the creation of an organising function with an organiser appointed to support branches in each region.
3. The Federation should agree clear role descriptions for all branch officer posts, including Rep, Chair and Secretary and develop training to support officers in their roles. This training should be planned on a national basis, and delivered on a local basis, through branches and regions, and supported and developed by the Federation’s newly created organising team.
4. The Federation should establish a revamped professional policy and research department reporting to the Chief Executive but with a strong dotted line to the new General Secretary role to research the foundations for possible campaigns that deliver against issues of concern to members.
The Culture of the PFEW:
5. The Federation centrally should provide the clearest possible guidance on the purpose and operation of Appendix 9 and regular updates for the regions and branches on the number of cases being investigated and the number of suspensions pending investigation and resolution of the complaint.
6. The Appendix 8 standards should be used as a basis to generate case studies of actions and behaviours which would result in the serving of an Appendix 9 notice.
7. Given the concerns about the operation of Appendix 9 we recommend that the Federation creates a complaints panel of rank-and-file members to hear cases and make judgements, with support from external specialists where appropriate.
8. All branch accounts should be declared and reported in the national accounts. Indeed, we would go further and urge the Federation to consider whether these resources could and should be combined with those of the centre to create one transparent resources pot to be deployed in accordance with organisational objectives. This should be a project supported by the Board with external input on the legalities, involving National Council members and branch officials too. In addition, the Federation should consider providing for future joiners regional group insurance schemes or a national scheme to secure the economies of scale that such a scheme could potentially unlock.
9. Branch accounts should all be audited by the same firm auditing the national accounts.
10. We urge the Federation to consider whether a regional rather than branch model of organisation would create greater parity between member areas, greater ability to resource locally and more powerful interactions with Chief Constables.
The governance of the Federation:
11. The National Chair and National Secretary roles should be abolished and replaced by a new role of General Secretary. They should also have a tenure limit, of a maximum of one 5-year term with the possibility of serving a further 3-year term. This ensures they retain a direct knowledge of the issues facing front-line police officers and don’t become ‘institutionalised’ by protracted periods at Head Office, whilst still giving time for them to gain the experience valuable in executing the role effectively.
12. A revised Deputy General Secretary role should be formed as outlined above, with a tenure limit of two four-year terms.
13. The roles of National Secretary and National Chair should be abolished, in 2028 at the end of the next period of office.
14. The CEO role in the future to be made following a formal process led by a newly created Nominations Committee of the Federation and consisting of external advertising and formal interviews. The appointment should be approved by the General Secretary (as the representative of the members) and the National Board. Consent to this appointment should also be secured from the National Council.
15. The remuneration of the CEO and other senior executives should be set by a newly created Remuneration Committee on the recommendation of the General Secretary in the case of the CEO and the recommendation of the CEO in the case of other senior executives, with support from qualified benchmarking consultants. The CEO’s remuneration should be approved by the National Board and the structure reported to the National Council for discussion on a triennial basis. The amount of remuneration should be reported annually to the National Council and disclosed in the Annual Report and Accounts.
16. The function of the National Council should be changed, being to ascertain the views of members through meetings, surveys and the like and then bring those perspectives to bear on issues presented for debate.
17. The National Council should be radically reduced in size to facilitate effective debate. It should comprise 3 representatives from each of the 8 Regions (directly elected by the membership and not automatically Branch Chairs or Branch Secretaries) together with the General Secretary and up to 3 other members from protected categories or to ensure all ranks are represented. The CEO should attend Council meetings.
18. We recommend the National Council continues to meet 3 times a year.
19. We recommend tenure limits for National Council positions of two 4-year terms.
20. The role of the National Board should be redefined. Individuals should not be able to serve simultaneously on the National Board and the National Council.
21. The National Board should be reduced in size to 12-15 members comprising regional representation, the General Secretary and Deputy General Secretary, the CEO and independent external Non-Executive Directors, plus those from protected categories as required.
22. We recommend the appointment of 2 Independent Non-Executive Directors (iNEDs) as full members of the Board. One of these should be an individual with extensive senior leadership experience in HR and equalities issues who would chair the Remuneration Committee and another with the same in finance and audit matters, who would chair the Finance, Audit and Risk Committee.
23. It is again important that regional members of the National Board retain a connection to the pressures of front-line policing, as well as seeing these roles as a time-limited contribution not ‘jobs for life’. We therefore recommend a tenure limit of two four-year terms.
24. It should be the decision of the General Secretary which papers are to be presented to Board members during the meeting for confidentiality, and which papers should be distributed to Board members prior to the meeting in order to generate the most informed and considered response.
25. Board minutes should be shorter and clearer – with a summary of points raised in discussion which are not attributed to particular Board members, followed by a clear outcome of each discussion item which then becomes the first item at the next Board meeting, led by the General Secretary, to report on the further outcomes of the discussions at the last Board meeting.
26. To maintain the important connection to the regions National Board members should be appointed by the National Council on the recommendation of the Nominations Committee who have assessed that they match the person specification for the role. The regional representatives should be chosen from amongst previous or current Branch Chairs and Secretaries from the region they represent.
27. The Remuneration Committee should explore the question of remuneration of National Board members and consider a fixed and common honoraria instead of the current remuneration arrangements. It should also reexamine the overall level of additional remuneration for national roles. The General Secretary and Deputy General Secretary, as the democratic leaders of the Federation, should receive remuneration in line with the responsibilities and demands of this role benchmarked against similar positions in other member organisations.
28. The list of portfolios of National Board members should be reviewed to determine which should be retained by the National Board, which could be done by local officers on behalf of the National Federation, and which should be done by professional staff.
29. National Board members must maintain a strong connection to the region they represent and so should remain working or resident in that region, preferably based in the regional office and travelling to other locations for National Board business as needed.
30. Board meetings should alternate between regions.
31. Board members should chair a quarterly meeting with National Council members in their region, and with Branch Chairs and Branch Secretaries, to hear their views and experiences of the issues facing members in their region to inform their decisions on the campaigning, organising and policy positions adopted by the Federation.
32. Three subcommittees to the National Board should be constituted: a Nominations Committee, a Remuneration Committee and a Finance and Audit Committee with the functions and membership outlined above.
33. The position of full-time National Treasurer should be abolished and replaced by an honorary position possibly combined with that of Deputy General Secretary.
Implementation:
34. The Federation is supported in implementation of these recommendations not by a firm of consultants, but by a small independent reference group to provide challenge. It should be the responsibility of the CEO to ensure implementation of the recommendations outlined in this report, overseen by the National Board.
35. In order to reassure the membership and external stakeholders of the seriousness of the Federation in implementing these important reforms there should be a post implementation review each year after the publication of this report which would record the progress that has been made and report back to the wider membership. This should be repeated in 2028 to evaluate the full implementation programme.
