Number of new South Yorkshire Police officers hired has fallen, figures show, as funding formula criticised

New Home Office figures show South Yorkshire Police added a headcount of 28 officers to its ranks in the year to September 2024. The forced gained 37 the previous year.

As of September, there were 3,087 officers, up from 3,059 the year before.

It means there were 219 police officers per 100,000 people in South Yorkshire in September.

Steve Kent, chair of the South Yorkshire Police Federation, said a ‘nonsensical approach’ to funding is letting down people in ‘South Yorkshire and other poor northern police forces’.

“South Yorkshire Police, despite the false rhetoric behind ‘Boris’ extra cops’ are still significantly down on our peak numbers of the past, which was nearly 3,400 in the mid-1990s.

“We then dropped to a ridiculous and outrageous low of approximately 2,600 around 2015. So we are still nowhere near where we need to be,” said Steve.

He added: “This is partly down to the ridiculous funding formula which means in a nutshell that more affluent counties in England receive more income from council tax, despite generally having significantly less crime. The people of South Yorkshire and other poor northern forces are being let down by this nonsensical approach.”

Detailing the ‘detrimental’ impact on the funding formula is having on South Yorkshire Police officers, Steve continued: “The knock on effect to our officers and staff is also detrimental. We are expected to do so much with so little resources and funding, meaning that our officers are literally some of the busiest in terms of incidents per officer in the entire country.

“Again to illustrate the point there are forces with the same crime levels and similar populations to South Yorkshire, who in some cases have nearly an extra 1,000 officers. That is crazy, and despite all this in the last round of force inspections South Yorkshire was ranked in the top five forces in the country.

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“Again with one of the tightest budgets and some of the most limited resources. This shows the frankly unbelievable job our officers do. But this above and beyond the redline performance cant carry on indefinitely and our officers are very tired.

“We need to see significant investment into poorer forces and significant rises in officer numbers, so we can continue to service the public so well but also mean our officers aren’t at risk of burnout.”

The Home Office figures show that nationally, the headcount of officers stood at 148,900 – down 278 from the year before and dropping from a peak of 149,800 in March.

The Government's Police Uplift Programme, which was introduced by Boris Johnson and ended in March 2023, met its target of recruiting 20,000 police officers across England and Wales.

Across England and Wales, the number of FTE officers fell from a record 147,700 in March to 146,900 in September.

It was the lowest figure since September 2022.

However, the total paid police workforce size (including police officers, police staff, designated officers and police community support officers) in England and Wales increased by 0.2 per cent between March and September.

In December, Prime Minister Keir Starmer promised a £100 million investment in the Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee to deliver 13,000 additional neighbourhood policing officers, police community support officers and special constables by the end of this Parliament.

A Home Office spokesperson said: "As part of our mission to make our streets safer, we will restore neighbourhood policing and ensure every community has a named and contactable neighbourhood police officer.

"We will deliver an extra 13,000 neighbourhood police officers, community support officers and special constables, all of whom will play a vital role in bringing visible policing to our streets.

"Alongside this, we are committed to working with police forces to ensure overall officer numbers are protected."