Chart: Government proposals would mean pay for new police officers will have fallen by a quarter in 13 years

The Home Office has proposed a 3.5% increase in police pay for 2023. If that were applied equally across all pay points, it would mean that a police constable who has just completed initial training in England and Wales would be paid about £9,500 less in 2023 than they would have been in 2010 once inflation is taken into account – a real-terms reduction of 26%. These figures exclude overtime and special allowances, but those are unlikely to have made up for decreasing basic pay.

larger image | annotated R code to produce this chart

Data source: Police Federation, Home Office

Pay for years up to 2022 has been adjusted for inflation using the Office for National Statistics preferred CPIH measure. For 2023, the CPI inflation forecast produced by the Office for Budge Responsibility in November 2022 (the latest available) has been used.