POLICE officers retiring early due to ill health in Greater Manchester cost the tax payer almost £250,000 last year.

Home Office figures showed that 46 per cent of all officers who retired did so on bumped-up medical pensions.

Now critics, including the new Home Secretary David Blunkett, have police officers and their pensions in their sights, claiming they take money away from fighting crime.

But is the Government right to crack the whip? Or, are police officers just getting what they are entitled to for their years risking life and limb?

Certainly most people would agree that, in these days of rising violent crime, being a police officer is no bed of roses.

Each day officers go to work knowing they could be physically or mentally injured in the course of their duties and see their careers go up in smoke.

In these circumstances it is not surprising that a substantial number are retired from the force through injury or stress each year with an upgraded medical pension.

But is being a police officer really so stressful and dangerous that almost half of Greater Manchester Police's retiring officers last year left on ill health grounds?

Whether this is the case or not, Greater Manchester Police (GMP), one of Britain's biggest forces headed by Chief Constable David Wilmot, has admitted it has a problem.

Figures supported by the Home Office suggest that GMP's 111 officers who retired on ill health grounds last year cost the taxpayer £238,650.

This is based on Home Office figures which show a 50-year-old sergeant who quit on ill health grounds after 27 years would receive £43,000 more than a normal pension over the next 20 years.

Across the country this translates as £2.6 million a year -- or the cost of putting an extra 80 bobbies on the beat.

And the funds used to pay the pensions also come directly from each force's pockets, cutting the amount available to spend on fighting crime.

A Home Office spokesman confirmed Greater Manchester's figures were higher than most other forces but said no force would be singled out for special treatment.

He said: "Thirty one per cent was the average across England and Wales and in Lancashire, for instance, the level was 21.52 per cent.

"In comparison with Greater Manchester, it is higher. But it is too early to comment any further on the cases of individual forces."

He added that Mr Blunkett was now keen to address the issue of medical pensions as part of his general reform of the police force.

He said: "Police reform is top of our agenda and police medical pensions one of the areas we are looking at.

"Reform means giving the police the support they need. We need to look at ways of enabling police to spend more time on the beat."

But Paul Kelly, the Greater Manchester Police Federation chairman, denied there was a culture in the force of officers taking retirement "on the sick".

He said: "The law is very clear -- if an officer is not fit to carry out their duties and there is an air of permanency about it then that person should be retired from the force.

"It is the chief constable's decision to do so and it must be approved by the police doctor.

"Our chief constable has strictly adhered to that law which has resulted in our numbers of retirements being higher than other forces. I definitely do not agree, therefore, that there is a culture of officers leaving the force 'on the sick.'"

Mr Kelly added that the Greater Manchester force's previous policy of retiring officers unable to carry out full duties rather than give them desk jobs was different to other forces.

He added: "This force used not to offer officers who were unable to handle a riot, for instance, desk jobs. But I think pressure has been put on them to stop giving out so many medical pensions and as a result these desk jobs have started to be offered more.

"A lot of officers were retired in the past against their will. That is not mentioned very much."

While admitting there was a problem, GMP said it had "made good progress" cutting the number of officers taking ill-health retirement in recent years.

From a peak of 207 five years ago it has cut the level to 111 last year and expects less than 100 to take medical pensions this year.

A spokesman said he recognised that high levels of sickness and ill health retirement had an impact on the service the force could offer the community.

He added: "Policing is by no means an easy career. Officers deal with situations daily which many of us hope we will never have to face.

"The stresses and strains of the profession mean that an ill health retirement scheme will always be a necessity."

He added: "GMP have a robust policy in place for reviewing every case of long term absence on an individual basis and have introduced a number of preventative measures to tackle sickness before it becomes a problem.

"These include physiotherapy and counselling services to supplement the occupational health team. GMP are also using a range of specialists with the aim of assessing and rehabilitating officers wherever possible at an early stage." Police officers retiring early for medical reasons cost UK taxpayers millions of pounds every year BUMPED UP PENSIONS: Almost half of all Greater Manchester's retiring police officers did so on grounds of ill-health and inset, Home Secretary David Blunkett is seeking to crack the whip over the issue