Occupational Health

Question 

1. Could the PSNI supply the figure for how many officers have gone onto half pay due to delays with occupational health, in regards to the ill health retirement process? 

2. How many officers have left the PSNI in the last 3 Month,6 Month, and 12 Month period? 

3. What the current figures are currently off on long term sickness?

4. Could the PSNI supply the statically breakdown on officers leaving the force based on age from 2021-2023 period? 

Answer

OHW have waiting times, the rate of which rises and falls depending on the number of requests for IHR. Requests are made by the officers themselves though this can be at any stage of a referral. This means someone can request an IHR to be considered at the first referral right through to any stage in OHW assessment and or treatment. It is therefore not possible to determine the waiting times from initial request to consideration of pay. In addition, consideration of off pay is impacted by levels of absence and the levels of previous absence of an officer are a consideration. Some officers have longer periods of absence when the make the request for OHW, these are extremely variable .OHW manage IHR requests in chronological order from the request for consideration is made There are delays in the process that are also outside the control of OHW such as seeking full copies of GP and consultant notes. Following consent being received for same this can take between 4 weeks and 10 weeks to receive from relevant GP. 

Many officers cite a perceived delay in their OHW appointment when submitting an application for an extension to pay however, the clinical wait times to be seen by OHW regarding an IHR do not constitute delays caused by the organisation. These will be classed as normative wait times. However, if an appointment was changed or cancelled by OHW, the delay would be the organisation’s fault in those circumstances. To establish this information would require considerable tasking as each record would have to be checked manually as there is no current report that would provide this information. 
 

2. Police officer Leavers over last 12 months: 

3. The total number of police officers and police staff absent from work due to a sickness absence of 28 days or more is 558. This is further broken down into 477 police officers and 81 police staff. 

4. Police officer leaving by age: 

Cheryl Brownlee MLA - DUP