Police to get above-inflation boost after 11th-hour spending review wrangling
Policing is expected to receive an above-inflation boost in the spending review after eleventh-hour Cabinet negotiations over the weekend.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves is prepared to announce real-terms increases to budgets for the service every year as she sets out spending plans for the next three years on Wednesday.
The Times newspaper reported the boost would see cuts to other areas of the Home Office, which had been facing a significant squeeze to pay for extra funding in the NHS and defence.
Ms Reeves is expected to highlight health, education and security as top priorities when sharing out some £113 billion freed up by looser borrowing rules.
But she has acknowledged that she has been forced to turn down requests for funding for projects she would have wanted to back in a sign of the behind-the-scenes wrangling over her spending review.
Economists have warned the Chancellor faces unavoidably tough choices in allocating funding for the next three years.
She will need to balance manifesto commitments with more recent pledges, such as a hike in defence spending, as well as her strict fiscal rules which include a promise to match day-to-day spending with revenues.
The expected increase to police budgets comes after two senior policing figures publicly warned the Chancellor that the service is 'broken' and forces are left with no choice but to cut staff to save money.
Nick Smart, the president of the Police Superintendents' Association, and Tiff Lynch, acting national chairman for the Police Federation of England and Wales, said policing was in 'crisis'.
In a joint article for the Telegraph, they said: 'Police forces across the country are being forced to shed officers and staff to deliver savings. These are not administrative cuts.
'They go to the core of policing's ability to deliver a quality service: fewer officers on the beat, longer wait times for victims, and less available officers when crisis hits.'
The Department of Health is set to be the biggest winner in Ms Reeves' spending review on Wednesday, with the NHS expected to receive a boost of up to £30 billion at the expense of other public services.
Meanwhile, day-to-day funding for schools is expected to increase by £4.5 billion by 2028-9 compared with the 2025-6 core budget, which was published in the spring statement.
Elsewhere, the Government has committed to spend 2.5% of gross domestic product on defence from April 2027, with a goal of increasing that to 3% over the next parliament – a timetable which could stretch to 2034.
Ms Reeves' plans will also include an £86 billion package for science and technology research and development.
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