THE funding formula for police forces is “unfair”, the Home Office has admitted – after protests in Hampshire and elsewhere.
Ministers announced a quickfire review of the rules ahead of announcing grant allocations for the next financial year, when further hefty cuts are expected.
In the Commons, policing minister Mike Penning said: “There will be winners and losers – but, hopefully, it will be fairer.”
The move follows the warning, by Hampshire’s ‘Force Strategic Independent Advisory Group’, that the force is “at very significant risk” because of savage funding cuts.
The group also highlighted how neighbourhood policing could disappear from Hampshire if the cuts continue – “leaving only response to 999 and major incidents”.
The force’s budget has been slashed by almost six per cent in 2015-16, with steep cuts to “unprotected” departments – such as the Home Office – set to continue, under Conservative plans.
Mr Penning told MPs: “We will consult this summer, so we have a fairer formula than we inherited from the party opposite.”
The minister gave no clues about how the formula might be changed, admitting it was a “very tight timescale” to make the switch before allocations are announced for next April.
However, the Home Office is under fierce pressure from Conservative MPs to rejig the rules in favour of rural forces, which could penalise England’s big cities.
They argue the formula fails to take into account the extra costs of policing over longer distances, or the number of holiday visitors that many rural areas attract.
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