London police wage hikes have outpaced provincial inflation by 32% over the past decade, figures crunched by the force’s executives show.

While the officers’ union makes no apologies for its success negotiating rich contracts, city council’s rocky path to the just-approved 2014 police budget underscored that skyrocketing wages are the core cause of runaway policing costs.

Those realities will be the backdrop when police brass and the London Police Association, representing 600 officers plus civilian staff, start new contract talks this year.

A key question looms: Will London cops — benefiting from a decade-plus of hefty raises — voluntarily take less than they could get through arbitration, or even accept a wage freeze, from an economically battered city?

The answer, in short: It’s a possibility.

“I’m absolutely willing to sit down and negotiate that,” association president Rick Robson said, provided, he added, the board that oversees the force addresses cops’ concerns about work-life balance.

“It’s a collective agreement and . . . not all of it is about money.”

But for city politicians, who put up unprecedented resistance to this year’s police budget request, that’s exactly what it’s about.

Figures crunched by police brass indicate that from 2003 to 2013, police pay in Ontario’s 12 largest centres, including London, rose 32% more than the consumer price index, which is essentially the rate of inflation.

Robson hadn’t seen that figure, but acknowledged it sounds accurate.

The police budget, now $92.5 million, has ballooned from $51.9 million in 2003 — and the large annual increases are eaten up almost entirely by officer pay raises.

London politicians, presiding over a city hammered by the recession and still struggling with job losses, pushed back hard on the police budget request this year. Mayor Joe Fontana even publicly urged officers to take a wage rollback (despite having signed off on their last contract).

The challenge for taxpayers, essentially, is that many Ontario police boards are filled with unqualified political appointees — and they often sign rich contracts with their officers. Once a single such deal is signed, it becomes the arbitration benchmark for all other forces provincewide.

That’s why the London police board is leading a co-ordinated strategy among boards across Ontario: By standing firm on contract talks, the unions can’t gain an arbitration toehold, and may have to accept modest contracts.

But there’s already cracks in that strategy. So locally, there’s hope community pressure will help convince officers to accept an inflationary raise, or even a pay freeze, as a nod to overburdened taxpayers.

Robson won’t rule out anything — and notes his members voluntarily took less in their last contract than they could have won in arbitration. That four-year deal, with average annual raises of 2.8%, or 11.2% in total, expires at year’s end.

He also bristles at the oft-repeated notion London police pay is “unsustainable.”

What’s unsustainable, he counters, are some operational decisions, chiefly what he calls the no-call-too-small approach requiring cops to handle matters as minor as stray dog sightings.

“It’s ridiculous that police attend these calls,” he says. “That’s unsustainable.”

Choosing his words carefully, Robson says Londoners who believe the force is overstaffed should think twice: “If people were aware of the number of police officers available to respond to their calls at four o’clock in the morning, they may be a little concerned.”

Ultimately, few could blame a union or association for getting as much as possible.

But the police are a public sector group and officers draw criticism, even outright bias, from some citizens, so the context grows more tense. And when police board chair Michael Deeb makes questionable comments like he did this week — “there are people’s lives at stake,” he said, as politicians discussed budget belt-tightening — public frustration mounts.

Earlier in the budget season, Coun. Joe Swan addressed that very concern: “We’re losing the support of the public for the police department.”

patrick.maloney@sunmedia.ca

twitter.com/patatLFPress

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Police budget facts

11.2%:Total raises in last four-year contract, 2.8% a year; expires year-end.

32%:Height raises have gone above inflation since 2003.

$92.5 million:This year’s London police budget

93%:Portion of budget consumed by wages and benefits