FOI 33300
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: HRC0033300/26
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 2nd October 2026. Please find below the response to your request:
Please provide the following expenditure incurred by West Mercia Police for **each of the last four completed financial years**, with each year reported separately\.
### 1\. Misconduct hearings and proceedings
Please provide total expenditure associated with police misconduct hearings/proceedings, including, where separately recorded:
- Legally Qualified Persons/Chairs;
- Independent Panel Members;
- hearing venues and room hire;
- external legal services;
- solicitors;
- barristers/counsel;
- experts or specialist advisers;
- transcription/recording services;
- travel and mileage;
- rail and other transport;
- hotels and other accommodation;
- food, refreshments and drinks;
- subsistence and expenses; and
- any other directly attributable costs of conducting misconduct hearings\.
### 2\. Professional Standards Department investigations
Please provide expenditure attributable to PSD investigations into police officers and staff, including, where separately identifiable:
- external investigators or investigative services;
- external legal advice;
- specialist/expert services;
- travel and mileage;
- rail and other transport;
- hotels/accommodation;
- food, refreshments and drinks;
- subsistence and expenses; and
- any other externally incurred or directly attributable investigation costs\.
Where possible, please distinguish ordinary PSD staffing costs from additional expenditure incurred in conducting investigations\.
### 3\. External legal services and counsel
Please provide total expenditure on external solicitors, law firms, barristers and counsel relating to police misconduct, disciplinary proceedings and associated appeals\.
Where recorded, please separately identify expenditure relating to:
- misconduct hearings;
- Police Appeals Tribunals;
- judicial reviews; and
- other litigation arising from misconduct or disciplinary proceedings\.
### 4\. Travel, accommodation, hospitality and subsistence
To avoid ambiguity, please separately provide, if held, the **total expenditure associated with misconduct proceedings and PSD investigations** on:
- hotels/accommodation;
- mileage;
- rail travel;
- taxis and other transport;
- food;
- drinks and refreshments;
- subsistence allowances;
- hospitality; and
- other expenses claimed by panel members, legally qualified persons/chairs, counsel, external lawyers, witnesses, investigators or other persons attending in connection with such proceedings\.
### Format requested
Please provide the information **for each of the last four completed financial years individually**, rather than as a cumulative four\-year total\.
Where possible, I would be grateful for a table or spreadsheet showing:
**Financial year \| Misconduct hearing costs \| PSD investigation costs \| Legal services \| Counsel \| Travel \| Hotels \| Food/refreshments \| Other expenses \| Total**
I am seeking aggregate financial information only and do not require the identities of individual officers, staff members or persons involved in particular proceedings\.
Where expenditure is not recorded under precisely these headings, please provide the closest categories held and explain what is included\.
Reply
Your request for information has been considered in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“the Act”), and I am not obliged to provide the information requested.
S.12(1) of the Act states that a public authority is not obliged to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the “appropriate limit”. For police forces in England and Wales, the "appropriate limit" is £450 or 18 hours of work as set by the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
The information you have requested is not available in a readily retrievable format. There are over 166 records. In order to ascertain whether the information you have requested is held would take in excess of 18 hours as each record would have to be checked individually.
In accordance with s.17(5) of the Act, this acts as a Refusal Notice.
Under s.16 of the Act I have a duty to provide advice and assistance in relation to your request.
However, in accordance with Section 16 of the Act I have a duty to provide advice and assistance in relation to your request. You may wish to refine and resubmit your request to receive part of the information.
For example, we can provide pay and non-pay costs incurred by PSD broken down by general ledger code, but we are not able to detail what costs are attributable to types of investigations or by specific investigations as we do not code costs by investigation but by department.
The travel & subsistence expenditure incurred by PSD for the last four years would be some of the figures provided, but again we are unable to break this down to the level of detail being requested.
The request around wanting the legal costs of external barristers, lawyers or solicitors again broken down by investigation will not be able to be provided.
We can provide total cost of the legal team, pay and non-pay, but again they are not broken down by investigation and there will be costs within the information that are the staff cost of supporting the legal team as a whole.