Police majority vote to lobby for full industrial rights.

Press release from the Police Federation:

20 May 2008

This afternoon in the Opening Speech to conference (available on the website) Jan Berry announced the results of the Police Federation/Ipsos MORI poll of the membership on binding arbitration and full industrial rights.

They are:

A total of 60,572 responses were received.

Q1. Do you think decisions made by the independent Police Arbitration Tribunal should or should not be binding on the Government?

Yes, should be binding = 93%
No, should not be binding = 3%
No opinion/don't know/not stated = 4%

Q2. In the current absence of binding arbitration on the Government, do you wish the Police Federation of England and Wales to start to lobby for a change in legislation to allow police officers full industrial rights?

Yes = 86%
No = 11%
No opinion/don't know/not stated = 3%

Chairman of the Police Federation, Jan Berry says:

" I do not see this as a vote for strike action; it's a vote for binding independent arbitration.

" This is a wake up call for the government, and they must listen to what the police officers of England and Wales are telling them."

Jacqui Smith will address the Police Federation Conference tomorrow - I bet she is looking forward to that!

Keith Vaz, Labour chairman of the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee, said: "I urge the home secretary to immediately enter into a dialogue with the leaders of the federation to ensure that the necessity for them to take such action is considerably diminished, if not eliminated."

Will they listen and learn?