Police Act 1969



Police Act 1969

1969 CHAPTER 63

An Act to enable assistance to be given to the Royal Ulster Constabulary by home police forces and empower the Parliament of Northern Ireland to enable assistance to be given to home police forces by the Royal Ulster Constabulary; to make provision in connection with the giving of assistance to home police forces by the Royal Ulster Constabulary; to establish a Police Council for the United Kingdom in place of the Police Council for Great Britain; and to enable certain police pensions regulations to be made with retrospective effect and alter the mode of exercising parliamentary control of the power to make them.

[11th December 1969]

Be it enacted by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—

S-1 Aid by home police forces of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and vice versa

1 Aid by home police forces of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and vice versa

(1) The chief officer of police of a police force maintained under the Metropolitan Police Act 1829 , the Act of the second and third years of Queen Victoria intituled ‘An Act for regulating the Police in the City of London’ (commonly known as the City of London Police Act 1839 ), the Police Act 1964 or the Police (Scotland) Act 1967 (hereafter in this Act referred to as a ‘home police force’) may, on the application of the Inspector General of the Royal Ulster Constabulary or of such other person as may be designated for the purposes of this subsection by order of the Secretary of State, provide constables or other assistance for the purpose of enabling the last-mentioned force to meet a special demand on its resources.

(2) The Secretary of State, if satisfied by the Minister of Home Affairs for Northern Ireland that it is expedient in the interests of public safety or order that the Royal Ulster Constabulary should be reinforced or should receive other assistance for the purpose of enabling it to meet a special demand on its resources and that satisfactory arrangements under the foregoing subsection cannot be made or cannot be made in time, may, at his request, direct the chief officer of a home police force to provide such constables or other assistance for that purpose as may be specified in the direction.

(3) A constable shall, during any period during which he is provided under this section for the assistance of the Royal Ulster Constabulary be under the like direction and control as a member of that force notwithstanding section 5(1) of the Police Act 1964 or section 17(2) of the Police (Scotland) Act 1967 (controlling powers of chief constables).

(4) An enactment of the Parliament of Northern Ireland which makes provision for the Royal Ulster Constabulary to assist a home police force shall be deemed to be within the powers of that Parliament notwithstanding anything in the Government of Ireland Act 1920 .

S-2 Provisions for facilitating the engagement of members of home police forces for periods of service in the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

2 Provisions for facilitating the engagement of members of home police forces for periods of service in the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

(1) The following provisions shall have effect with respect to a member (other than the chief officer) of a home police force who, with the consent of the appropriate authority and the Secretary of State, engages for a period of service in the Royal Ulster Constabulary, namely:—

(a ) during that period (or if, during the course thereof, he is dismissed from the Royal Ulster Constabulary or is required to resign as an alternative to dismissal, during such part of that period as ends when he is dismissed or required to resign) he shall, except for the purpose of his being promoted in his home force, be treated as if he were not a member thereof; and

(b ) he shall, when, by virtue of the foregoing paragraph, he ceases (except for the purpose aforesaid) to be treated as if he were not a member of his home force, be entitled to revert to that force—

(i) if he has not been promoted in that force during his period of service in the Royal Ulster Constabulary, in the rank in which he was serving immediately before he engaged for a period of service in the last-mentioned force;

(ii) if he has been so promoted, in the rank to which he has been promoted.

(2) Where, in the case of a person to whom the foregoing subsection applies, the period of service in the Royal Ulster Constabulary for which he engages is, with the consent of the appropriate authority and the Secretary of State extended or curtailed, paragraph (a ) of that subsection shall have effect in relation to him as if, for the references to that period, there were substituted references, as the case requires, to the extended period or the curtailed period.

(3) A person to whom subsection (1) above applies who is dismissed or required to resign as mentioned in paragraph (a ) of that subsection shall, for the purposes of the Police (Discipline) Regulations, be deemed to have committed, as a member of his home force, an offence against discipline, and may be dealt with under those Regulations accordingly; and for the purposes of this subsection a certificate that such a person has been so dismissed or required to resign, being a certificate given by or on behalf of the Inspector General of the Royal Ulster Constabulary or such other person, or such authority, as may be designated for the purposes of this subsection by order of the Secretary of State, shall be evidence (and, in Scotland, sufficient evidence) of that fact.

(4) Paragraph 2 of Schedule 4 to the Police Act 1964 (which, in a case where, at a time when a member of a police force in England or Wales is on central service or is serving overseas, that force is amalgamated with another, converts his right of reversion to his force into a right of reversion to the amalgamated force) shall have effect as if, after sub-paragraph (b ) thereof, there were inserted the following words—

‘or

(c ) section 2 of the Police Act 1969’,

and section 24(1) of the Police (Scotland) Act 1967 (which makes similar provision in the case of a member of a police force in Scotland) shall have effect as if, after paragraph (b ) thereof, there were inserted the same words.

(5) In this section—

(a ) ‘appropriate authority’, in relation to a member of a home police force, other than an assistant chief constable or a deputy chief constable, means the...

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