Commissioner’s office costs £2.4 million

GREATER Manchester’s police and crime commissioner and his support staff cost taxpayers £2.4million a year — the second-highest amount in England and Wales.

More was spent on wages than in any other police area in England — £1.88 million, says lobby group the TaxPayers’ Alliance.

But the Manchester commissioner’s office is one of 23 that cost less than the police authorities they replaced. Spending in Greater Manchester has fallen by £510,000 (17.3 per cent) since the police authority was replaced in 2010. Nationally the cost is £2million less.

But it reckons £29 million — the equivalent of the starting salaries of 1,227 bobbies — could be saved if all OPPCs performed as well as the most efficient, Thames Valley, which cost every voter 62.4p (as opposed to Greater Manchester’s commissioner, which costs £1.22 for each voter.

The TaxPayers’ Alliance also criticised individual commission offices for having as many as seven members of staff for PR or communications, beleving the money could be better spent on uniformed officers. Greater Manchester has four communications officers out of 31 staff