If money talks, then in West Mercia it positively shouts. The Police and Crime Commissioner’s office costs a fortune — and for what? Let’s count the purse strings.
The Quarter-Million Pound Question
Here’s the top of the food chain — the first dip into your council tax purse:
• Gareth Boulton – Chief Executive – £106,478
The Guardian Former Worcestershire County Council man and now the Commissioner’s senior civil servant. He personally ran the Chief Constable recruitment process, following the Home Office tick‑box rules with gusto. Independence? Only if you confuse “form‑filling” with “oversight.”
• John‑Paul Campion – Police & Crime Commissioner – £78,404
Ex‑prison intelligence officer and once the youngest leader of Wyre Forest District Council. Famous for handing libraries to volunteers in the name of “savings” and for chasing “efficiencies” like a man possessed. Then came the pièce de résistance — his attempted takeover of the Fire & Rescue Service, pitched as a “£4 million saving.” Whitehall politely replied: no thanks. The empires may be imaginary, but the ambition is very real. And on basic hiring? In 2024 he presided over the ‘find‑a‑chief’ fiasco: after trumpeting a Met commander as West Mercia’s next Chief Constable, the appointment collapsed before he had worked a day — leaving the force leaderless until a do‑over process finally produced Richard Cooper in March 2025.
• Marc Bayliss – Deputy PCC – £52,900
A man welded to the council chamber: parish councillor, city councillor, school governor. Installed as Deputy PCC in 2022, quietly reconfirmed after the 2024 election. His CV reads like the Yellow Pages of local politics: everywhere, always available, and never far from a salary line.
• Assistant PCC – ~£19,000 for a part‑time role
Two and a half days a week, name absent, expenses present. A bargain, apparently.
That’s £256,000 a year before you’ve seen a single officer’s boots on a single street.
Oswestry: Cameras, Not Constables
Meanwhile, Oswestry spends £25,000+ a year keeping its CCTV blinking — far more than Ellesmere (£7,000) or Market Drayton (£2,000).
And who’s running the show? Jim Stafford, the county’s only dedicated CCTV co‑ordinator — and, coincidentally, a former police inspector. Experience, say the faithful. Some of us might prefer the word nepotism or cronyism or even ‘jobs for the boys’.
So Oswestry pays for its own “electronic constables,” while the Commissioner’s purse strings tighten when it comes to real ones.
Seventy‑Five Staff and Counting
The Commissioner’s office employs around seventy-five. That’s not a team; it’s a cottage industry — an entire payroll dedicated to supervising the absence of police.
But what do they actually do?
– They don’t patrol.
– They don’t investigate.
– They don’t answer 999.
– They don’t even run the CCTV (ask Mr Stafford).
Instead, they “strategise,” “consult,” “engage,” and churn out glossy “community reassurance” reports. In other words, they administrate the illusion of accountability.
The Organisational Chart: A Work of Comedy
The OPCC chart is a marvel of modern management—boxes upon boxes, titles upon titles. It looks less like a policing office and more like a mini-Whitehall with a logo problem. Campion (elected) presides over a tidy pyramid of career administrators, each with a job title longer than most charge sheets. Plenty of civil service… not a warrant card in sight.
The illusion of accountability — now available in boxes and arrows.
For every constable missing from your high street, there’s a box filled by someone with a clipboard. It’s empire-building in diagram form — and no empire is complete without a failed conquest (see: Fire & Rescue).
The Sleight of Hand
The Commissioner calls it “value for money.” Translated, it means:
– You pay for CCTV.
– You pay for 75 staff to tell you how valuable CCTV is.
– You pay for reports about how engaged you feel about paying for CCTV.
– And you get to admire a £1.98 mileage claim online as proof of fiscal prudence.
Meanwhile, the streets grow quieter — not from peace, but from the absence of police.
And the Punchline
A quarter-million-pound payroll at the top, seventy-five staff behind desks, one man keeping Oswestry’s cameras alive — and the Commissioner still playing emperor with other people’s services.
For scale: West Mercia’s net budget for 2025/26 is about £302.7 million. The Commissioner’s office takes roughly 8% of that — around £25.2 million. That’s about 8p in every £1 you pay — enough to fund Oswestry’s £25,000 CCTV pot a thousand times over. Yet somehow, the dividend isn’t more constables — it’s more clipboards.
So here’s the obvious question — the one no report, chart, or “strategy” ever answers:
What do these 75 staff in the Commissioner’s office actually do all day?
Coming Next…
In Commissioner Watch (3) an independent review of police complaints? Don’t laugh. It’s farmed out to ex-police officers with business cards. Sancus Solutions Ltd: the foxes invoicing the henhouse.”
Stay tuned for Commissioner Watch (3): Complaint or Compliment? How the PCC Handles Public Grievances — where complaints go to die, and consultants get paid to bury the body.