Published at 11:09, Thursday, 03 May 2012

SICKNESS rates are up again among Cumbria’s police, with the force missing its illness targets in most departments.

Figures show officer and civilian staff absences for the three months up to April have climbed compared to both the months before and the same point last year.

This means the force has had to pay out more than £520,000 in wages to officers who were off work ill and more than £172,000 to other staff absent in this period.

Sickness rates for detectives at the force’s CID department and officers working from its headquarters near Penrith did come in below the set target.

Cumbria’s chief constable, Stuart Hyde, revealed the results in a report to the watchdog monitoring the force.

A similar report three months ago named an ongoing cost-cutting shake-up at Cumbria police as a potential factor in the rise at that time. The possibility of this having an impact is mentioned again.

Published by http://www.whitehavennews.co.uk