MORE than £1.5 million in redundancy payments have been paid out by North Yorkshire Police in the past five years.

Since 2010, 175 members of police staff have been made redundant, though no warranted officers have been required to leave the force.

Figures obtained by The Press under the Freedom Of Information Act show a total of £1,501,734.80 has been paid out in redundancy in the last five years, an average of £300,346.96 each year, or £822 a day.

Though averaging at £8,581.34 per redundancy, the 175 payments actually range from zero to more than £40,000.

One staff member with less than five years service, on a salary of £27,267, received no redundancy payout, while another on a salary of £36,963 received £3,189.96.

The highest redundancy payout was for a worker with between six and ten years' service, on a salary of £80,988, who was awarded more than half their annual salary when they left the force, £41,936.13.

Statutory redundancy pay is calculated as 1.5 weeks' pay for each year of employment where the staff member is aged 41 or over, one week for each year of employment for those aged 22 to 40, and half a week's pay for those aged between 17 and 21, up to a maximum of 20 years, and staff must have been employed for more than two years.

The figures show the highest number of redundancies came from workers who had been in police service for between six and ten years - though not necessarily with North Yorkshire Police - with £522,241.30 paid out in the last five years.

Just over £80,588 was paid out to those with less than five years service, just over £232,231 to those with 11 to 15 years service, almost £200,000 to those with 16 to 20 years service (£199,915.09).

Payouts totalling £306,211.21 went to staff with between 21 and 25 years' service, while £160,546.88 went to those with more than 26 years' service.