Allard & Ors v Devon & Cornwall Constabulary

A police officer may be recalled to duty between rostered tours without receiving a specific instruction at the time. A recall occurs where the officer’s current orders require the performance of a task arising during an off-duty period.

Under the applicable overtime determination, an officer recalled between tours was entitled to reckon a minimum of four hours’ overtime. The provisions disregarding short periods of unplanned overtime applied to casual overtime at the end of a tour. They did not reduce or exclude that minimum allowance.

Three retired police officers had acted as handlers of covert human intelligence sources. Outside their rostered hours, an automated system notified them when a source sought contact. The officers claimed overtime for the resulting work.

His Honour Judge Simon Carr in the Central London County Court held that the officers were recalled, or required, to do duty in each of nine hypothetical scenarios. He treated the four-hour minimum allowance for a recall between tours as subject to a 30-minute deduction.

The Chief Constable appealed against liability and the computation of overtime. The officers cross-appealed against the deduction. The central issues were whether a recall required a specific contemporaneous order and whether the short-overtime disregards applied to the four-hour minimum.

1. Disposition. The Chief Constable’s appeal was dismissed and the officers’ cross-appeal was allowed. Lady Justice Gloster and Lord Justice Longmore agreed with Lord Justice Patten.
2. A recall to duty under regulation 25 of the Police Regulations 2003 did not invariably require a specific contemporaneous direction to return to duty. An officer placed merely on notice that a return might later be required was not recalled until specifically ordered. By contrast, a recall occurred where an event during an off-duty period engaged the officer’s current orders and required a particular task. The approach in Crosby v Sandford was applied.
3. The handlers were required to respond when available to requests for contact from registered sources. Their response therefore constituted a recall to duty even where the ensuing information was neither useful nor urgent. Contact with the controller concerning a de-registered and dangerous source was only preliminary to any authorised contact and did not itself constitute a recall. The handlers in the relevant rest-day and public-holiday scenarios were required to do duty.
4. Paragraph 1(h)(iii) of Annex G independently governed the computation of overtime following a recall between rostered tours. It entitled an officer recalled for a shorter period to reckon four hours’ overtime. Paragraph 1(g), and the related proviso in paragraph 1(d), concerned short or casual overtime at the end of an existing tour. They did not exclude a short recall or reduce the four-hour minimum.
5. The structure and language of Annex G were sufficient to reach that conclusion. The history of the police overtime provisions confirmed it. Successive regulations had treated casual overtime following a tour separately from recall between tours, and the later wording had not altered that distinction. The county court was therefore wrong to deduct 30 minutes from the four-hour allowance.

1. Court of Appeal (Civil Division): In [2015] EWCA Civ 42, dismissed the Chief Constable’s appeal and allowed the officers’ cross-appeal.
2. Central London County Court: His Honour Judge Simon Carr held that the officers were recalled, or required, to do duty in the nine scenarios, but reduced the four-hour minimum overtime allowance by 30 minutes. No citation is stated.