Settlement costs in April 2019 to March 2020 to April 2022 to March 2023

 

I note you seek access to the following information:

 

Under the FOI Act, can I request 

a) the overall number of cases settled and 

b) the total cost in settlement payouts in each financial year from April 2019 to March 2020 to April 2022 to March 2023, in relation to claims made to members of the public.

 

This would include particularly claims relating to discrimination or harassment. 

 

I would like to ask for the TOTAL AMOUNT PAID IN settlements following the resolution of all 

(a) bullying, (b) harassment and (c) discrimination cases by the force in the 

(i) April 2019 to March 2020, 

(ii) April 2020 to March 2021, 

(iii) April 2021 to March 2022 and 

(iv) April 2022 to March 2023 financial years.

 

A breakdown of the total number of payouts in each of the three categories in each financial year would also be helpful. 

 

I can confirm this request regards payments made both to internal staff and those to members of the public. 

I have today decided to disclose the located information to you in full. 

 

Please find below information pursuant to your request above.

 

To clarify as described in my previous response to you, copied below, we are unable to provide the information broken down by discrimination and harassment within the 18 hours under the Act.  Therefore, as per my advice to you previously, we have provided the overall settlement figures.

 

‘Firstly, in relation to payments made to members of the public I contacted our Directorate of Legal Services unit and they have advised that it will not be possible to provide you with the information broken down as you have requested within the 18hrs provided under the Act.

 

The reason for this is because each individual case where a payment has been made would need to be checked to determine the reason why the claim was bought as this information is not in a readily available format on our systems.

 

The is further complicated by the fact that claims generally comprise of multiple allegations, eg false imprisonment, excessive force etc and settlement payments are made in relation to the whole claim in entirety and not broken down as per your request.

 

An initial search was carried out for the financial year April 2022 to March 2023 and this returned in excess of 160 settlement payments, to go through each record would take in excess of the 18hrs provided under the Act.’

 

SETTLEMENT AND AMOUNT	April 2019 to March 2020		April 2020 to March 2021
	No. of Cases Settled	Settlement Total	No. of Cases Settled	Settlement Total
MALFEASANCE	130	£2,197,522	112	£3,455,138
PUBLIC LIABILITY	357	£430,607	323	£339,786
ROAD TRAFFIC	562	£3,383,570	530	£3,284,096
TOTAL	1049	£6,011,699	965	£7,079,020

 

SETTLEMENT AND AMOUNT	April 2021 to March 2022		April 2022 to March 2023
	No. of Cases Settled	Settlement Total	No. of Cases Settled	Settlement Total
MALFEASANCE	172	£2,496,368	198	£3,456,710
PUBLIC LIABILITY	408	£488,544	357	£495,804
ROAD TRAFFIC	522	£3,369,449	477	£1,895,796
TOTAL	1102	£6,354,361	1032	£5,848,310

 

DEFINITIONS:
Civil Claims (Malfeasance)	Claims from members of the public which may include allegations of excessive force; false evidence; misapplication of the law; misunderstanding of the law; deliberate wrongdoing or failure to act; deliberate or accidental neglect; breach of European Convention rights
Civil Claims (Public Liability)	Claims brought by members of the public – eg: Damage to property
Civil Claims (Road Traffic)	Claims brought by members of the public – eg: Damage to car by police
Settlement Total	Total paid out on Compensation
No. of Cases Settled	Total number of Compensation payments made