After the dust has now long (or more recently in some parts) settled on pay negotiations, what does the current police officer pay look like in 2025? How do England and Wales forces differ from Police Scotland and PSNI? What about the supplements received for the Met Police and other South East forces? How much is the salary for each rank from PC to Met Police Commissioner? How are negotiations for 2026 going and what are the Federation requesting? How might officers boost their own pay, temporarily or permanently?
In this blog I answer all these questions and more, as a kind of ‘state of the nation’ report on police officer pay. For more info on the latest pay awards and their apparent fairness, see my latest blogs on the 4.75% rise in England and Wales and the 4.75% for Scotland. And as usual, you’ll find the latest officer salaries for the entire UK over on my main website, the only place in the world showing such information all in one easy, convenient place…
Police Salary Comparisons Across All Ranks
So what does the current police officer salary look like for all ranks across the UK in 2025?
Starting with the Federated ranks, I’ve collated these above for you. England and Wales forces and the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) tend to match, using the same bands and increases. Police Scotland offer slightly better salary prospects at all ranks than E&W and PSNI, though as shown here it generally takes longer for officers in Scotland to reach the top pay point. Met Police top the table, given the London weightings and allowances.
I’ve compared the top of band for each rank, allowing for simpler and consistent comparisons between regions and ranks. Around half of all officers are at the top of their pay band, the rest are working towards it through ‘incremental progression’ each year. I won’t repeat the detailed annual pay band information here; you can glean that from my latest UK police salary (PC – Chief Inspector) page. For now, here’s a snapshot and example of that for England and Wales…
Adding in various allowances does make things more complex. Given the significance of the London weighting and allowances provided there, I’ve separated out the Met Police (City of London Police will be similar). Note however this doesn’t include the other allowances by force, for example PSNI currently have a ‘transitionary allowance’ of £4k and some England and Wales forces offer their own bolt-on allowances of between £2-£3k. I cover the basics of these on my detailed salary scales webpage, but here’s more detail on police officer allowances.
Salaries Across More Senior Police Ranks
Continuing the comparisons as done above, let’s go beyond Chief Inspector into the more senior ranks of Superintendent and Chief Officers. The below graph as you might expect has a bigger scale.
Again, the top salary band is used where relevant (Superintendent through to ACC / Met Commander). For Deputy Chief Constable (the Met Police ‘equivalent’ being Deputy Assistant Commissioner) and above, there’s just a single, predetermined salary point and no scale. For England and Wales forces, the DCC and Chief Constable salaries depend on the size of the force; I’ve used the highest ones for straightforward comparisons.
For the Superintending ranks, the London weightings push the Met Police salaries slightly ahead. The Police Scotland Chief Officers from ACC (Commander in the Met) to Chief Constable (‘equivalent’ being ‘Assistant Commissioner’ in the Met) attract higher salaries than other UK forces. Being a far larger force in terms of officer strength, I suppose it would be odd were it lower.
The Met Police have an additional two ranks than other forces, itself being double the size of Police Scotland in terms of strength. These are Deputy Commissioner, currently occupied by Matt Jukes, and Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley. Their salaries are £273k and £330k respectively.
The City of London Police Chief Officer roles are also called Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner, though as a smaller force these are more equivalent to Chief Constable and DCC in England and Wales forces. By the way, if you’d like to hear the City of London Commissioner’s perspectives on police promotion and leadership, listen in to my recent and exclusive podcast interview with Commissioner Peter O’Doherty.
What about starting salaries for officers?
Taking the standard allowances into account, here’s the starting salary for officers across the regions from high to low:
- Met Police: £40.8k
- PSNI: £34.0k
- Police Scotland: £31.5k
- England and Wales: £29.9k
Note that the Met Police currently advertise a starting salary of £41k. That’s £11k more than peers in England and Wales, while suggesting additional enhancements are currently in place for the entry-level rank of Police Constable. Also note that given the how variable and specific Police Scotland allowances are, I’ve just used Scotland’s published salaries.
It is notable Police Scotland offer better base salary early on and then incentivise those early years of loyalty, going from £31.5k to £37.0k (+£5.5k) within two years. By comparison, England and Wales officers start on £30.0k and only reach £32.5k (+£2.5k) within two years. Maybe this end of the scale would be a good point to target negotiations on, as cops struggle most in those early years of service?
Prospects for the 2025/26 Pay Award
Well, there’s clearly diverse views on this and how much officers should be paid and negotiations are already taking place. Each year the ‘Official Side’ and ‘Staff Side’ respectively submit their evidence to an independent panel, then that panel considers all the evidence and gives its recommendations to the government on what should happen.
In England and Wales forces along with PSNI, that panel is the Police Remuneration Review Body (PRRB) for Constable to Chief Superintendent and the Senior Salaries Review Body (SSRB) for Chief Officers. For Scotland, the independent panel is ACAS.
So what is being asked for between the respective parties in this battle between the two sides, ‘affordability vs. fairness’?
According to the Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW) calculations, since 2010 the pay scale for their members has fallen back by 21% against inflation. They calculate this against CPIH inflation, which includes both consumer prices and housing costs. As with the Peelian adage, “the police are the public and the public are the police”, all areas of working society have fallen behind since then, given the massive increases in housing and inflation costs for the country.
Here’s the chart the Federation produce in their final pay positioning report to the PRRB:
As such, their main ask on police pay is an increase of 21% to all officer salaries…
“An immediate closing of the gap that pay degradation has caused our members. This means immediate rectification to close a gap of 21 percent.” – PFEW
This means the ask is for Police Constable pay band to increase from the current £30-£48k to £36-£58k. For Inspectors this would move from the current £61-£66k to a new band of £74-£80k. In addition, PFEW are asking for a myriad of changes to allowances, conditions, annual leave, and much more, which could possibly extend negotiations well into Autumn.
This ‘door in the face’ technique may seem extreme, but it’s not unprecedented. For example, in 1979 police salaries increased by 45% overnight, following the Edmund Davies Review of police pay. Can you imagine such an act today? Here’s a summary of the rationale and implementation of this revolutionary change to police pay, which happened even before I joined policing…
“Following very severe problems with the recruitment and retention of police officers in England and Wales because of chronically low pay, which had by then fallen far behind the pay for comparable occupations, in August 1977 Edmund-Davies was appointed to chair a commission of inquiry into the negotiating machinery for police pay and conditions. His report was published in July 1978 and recommended a substantial increase in pay for police officers – of the order of 45 per cent. His recommendations were implemented in full in 1979 by the incoming Conservative Government, and the essential elements of the Edmund-Davies pay regime have remained undisturbed ever since… for police officers up to and including the rank of Chief Inspector.”
The Police Superintendents’ Association (PSA) and Superintendents’ Association of Northern Ireland (SANI) have requested a 4.8% increase in officer pay in their formal PRRB submission. The Police Federation for Northern Ireland have not published their submission yet. Meanwhile at the more senior level, the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC) are pitching to the SSRB for a 3.8% increase in police pay across all ranks, plus an additional rise for new officers.
The Home Office (the ‘Official Side’) are arguing to the PRRB for the lower end, proposing a far lower 2.8% increase in their own evidence submission. While all forces get more funding every year (as I demonstrate in my Peel Summary videos), they are all suffering from pay inflation. Most of their costs are for officer and staff salary, and these costs are going up each year. Forces, and particularly their Finance Directors, tend not to argue against pay awards at the lower ‘Official Side’ end!
North of the border, the ask from the Scottish Police Federation (SPF) is 4.5%. Plus significantly, the removal of four of the annual increment points for PCs, which would allow officers to reach the top of their pay band (£50.5k) four years sooner. The SPF also cites a need for pay restoration, following a real-terms decline in the police officer pay scale over the past 15 years. However, in a recent pay update, the SPF confirms that “the Official Side has flatly rejected any inclusion of a pay restoration element at this stage.”
The Association of Scottish Police Superintendents have made a headline claim of 4.5% for all pay points and ranks, citing a real-terms decline in police pay of 17% between 2000-2022. They also made a claim for a 15% pay restoration.
The pay awards for recent years have been similar across the UK. PSNI salary mirrors that for England and Wales, then Police Scotland pay awards have been in the same ballpark. This year’s inflation (be that CPI or CPIH) is between 3.5% – 4.0%. For a year-on-year and recent perspective, here’s how the last eight years have fared in terms of police pay award (E&W, PSNI) versus inflation.
Given recent pay awards and trends in recent years, inflation, the fact the SSRB are already recommending 3-4% for other senior public sector workers, along with the NPCC’s proposal seeming to give weight towards the Official Side of things, my guess is it will be landing somewhere around 3.5% to 4% overall. For Police Scotland officers, signs are the deal is close and in the region of 4%. What are your thoughts on this?
Whatever gets agreed, it usually takes effect from (and gets backdated in payslips to) 1 September 2025 for England and Wales forces and 1 April 2025 for Police Scotland.
Update 1 August: The PRRB has just recommended 4.2% increase for England and Wales police officer pay increase, along with other measures.
How Can I Boost My Police Pay?
There are several ways officers can boost pay right now…
- Change roles: Some roles attract local or national enhancements to salary, such as Detectives, Dog Handlers or Firearms roles. Clearly this isn’t appealing for all, but policing remains an attractive career choice for those who relish variety.
- Annual progression: While national pay awards are made to the salary scale itself, officers can progress through that scale if not already at the top of it. See example scenarios of pay increasing with experience here. But don’t fall short of the Pay Progression Standard required!
- Overtime: Overtime can significantly boost your salary by up to 2x. But of course, this option is only available to those with the time, opportunities and energy to do so, and the detrimental impacts on wellbeing are well-versed; this isn’t a long-term solution.
- Promotion: If overtime isn’t an option and you want to progress your career upwards, then promotion is the goal. Of course, this comes with enhanced salary right away to reflect the greater responsibilities. And if you want to prepare in the best and most time-efficient way possible, download your own rank-specific premium toolkit today!
Wherever you are on your promotion and career journey, I wish you every success for the future. For the best FREE support going, watch this space or YouTube for more free content and tune in to my podcast for interviews and in-depth leadership CPD. For the most effective preparation if you’re thinking about promotion or have an upcoming board, check out my rank-specific police promotion toolkits, Masterclass and CVF Explainers. All are relevant to all UK forces (and beyond!).
Kind Regards, Steve
Seeking police promotion? Want a MASSIVE head start right now? Hit the ground running with your personal digital promotion toolkit, and/or my market-leading Police Promotion Masterclass and CVF explainers. There’s nothing else like it to effectively prepare you for success in your leadership aspirations. You can also contact me to arrange more personal coaching support. Or try my podcast for your ongoing police leadership CPD covering a range of fascinating subjects.