Thanks MightyGem
I erased the cookies again and the Apply button popped up. Although it was mighty small at the bottom of the page.
Thanks for your help though.

Here are the numbers for the year 2018-2019.

Things don’t appear to be getting any better. After paying the same for 2017/18 as they did for 2016/17, the majority of Forces have seen an increase in costs. The Met’s costs have increased by nearly £1.5M. Ahh, but they’re doing a lot more you might say, but their number of Actioned Calls(when an aircraft turns up “On Scene”) have reduced by nearly 25%

Some Forces have seen considerable reductions in their annual costs; eg, Avon and Somerset down £352K, Merseyside down £461K, Surrey down £595K. However, A & S had nearly half the number of Actioned Calls that they had last year.

Some though had more Calls than last year and made savings, others had more and paid more, some had less Calls and paid more.

Is it Value For Money? Well, Surrey, A & S and The City of London might not think so, paying £5734, £3736 and ££3399 per Call respectively when Dyfed Powys are only paying £888.

So, cost are up by £876K, and Actioned Calls are down by 1420 on last year. The number of flying hours by the NPAS Bases is, by some quirk, the same as last year. Obviously more transit flying getting to those less number of Calls.

Any mistakes are probably mine.

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....3b16427b6d.png

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....1e484f8c97.png
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....6732563763.png

Hmm...just an ill conceived project from the start. A very short trial led the decision. An unsuitable aircraft(piston engine, where are yo going to get AVGAS overnight), that has just raised problem after problem. People who had no idea about what they were trying to do, and so on.

Civvy TFO's have a mix of experience and are remunerated accordingly. For example a brand new Police staff member would be on less than someone who has recently retired after 20 years of Air Support experience as a Police Officer.

Must be a shortage of applicants.
https://www.manchestereveningnews.co...ester-16987095

An interesting read in September's Police Aviation News on the debacle of NPAS and its fixed wing.
http://www.policeaviationnews.com/Ac...tember2019.pdf

No punches were pulled there and a few quips later on - DEA page 17.
Did they get a full compliment of crew?
Does make me wonder if the applications closed at the beginning of Sept which crews were being kept current at ACS in Perth?
Were there already crew on the books?

That's certainly the way I read it. Not only have they bought aeroplanes that they have been unable to use and funded a base to keep them at they have also been paying crews to not fly them and then hiring in other aircraft to enable them to stay current. Of course I could be wrong but just reading the PAN article that is what it looks like to me.

The game plan was to hire a Chief Pilot designate when they started the project [using the former Chief FW pilot from the GMP Defender] use him to set up the aircraft purchase and then add pilots as they went on.
They then brought in a non-pilot Project Officer [ex-military] so they had a team of three [the third being a police officer TFO] to run the coal face work. By 2018 the Project Officer left the job for another within NPAS [Aviation Safety] and shortly afterwards they brought in pilot 2.
So, as far as I can gauge there were just two pilots on the books until the recent advertising.

That was preceded by a BIG rumour that both pilots had "resigned in exasperation" this summer. That was rubbish [or a trap] it seems.

I have heard nothing on how successful NPAS have been with hiring new pilots but it must be difficult to attract anyone in the current CPL holder shortage.

Meanwhile there are just two months left until the latest operational due date of January.

Its all a bit like Brexit!

Is there any external oversight on the wasted funds at NPAS? or will it be a Brexit extension again for another year? ;)

Well there was official oversight in the form of the super critical police and fire inspectorate report but that was clearly just brushed under the carpet and never answered by NPAS. Which leaves a few other things to control what they do.... but each apparently to no avail.

We used to have the redacted content of the quarterly minutes of the strategic Board but unfortunately we read them and I commented on them so they withdrew them from the public domain. I have tried a FOI request for the missing ones but so far that has been just acknowledged and ignored ......

On a slightly different tack I see that Babcock are to have a pilot recruitment event in Salisbury in early November.... the lack of pilots is starting to bite hard.

11 vacancies saves about half a million per year. Better to lose shifts if the books look better??????????

Can anyone provide insight into current vacancies? I cant find anything specific online, anyone know what particular bases have vacancies?

Do we know what vacancies were filled after the drive?

Three new HR positions, two accountants and an H&S executive apparently.