Come Fly Away With Me (Part II)

Sir High, former Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland

The row that centres on a Freedom of Information request around the free flights job perk offered to Sir Hugh Orde looks set to run and run.

To recap, the PSNI were forced to disclose – against Sir Hugh’s wishes – what sort of arrangement was in place to fund flights for his family.

This disclosure [link] reveals Sir Hugh had it written into his contract that members of his family were entitled to free flights paid for by the PSNI.

However, according to the documents released Sir Hugh, who successfully sued a newspaper over freebie flight allegations, agreed at some point during his tenure to repay 50% of the cost.

Of course the disclosure that his family were allowed free flights has sparked the obviously follow-up question of how much those flights had cost, and what exactly was the agreement within his contract of employment.

A member of the Northern Ireland assembly is already asking questions [link]. So I’ve asked the question here [link].

Sir Hugh, is now President of the Association of Chief Police Officers, an organisation which is expected to be admitted into the FoI regime in the not too distant future.

You can see my previous post on the topic here [link]. I can see this ending up at a Tribunal.