POLICE OFFICERS across Scotland have been paid more than £14million in bonuses in the last year, it has been revealed.

But the payments, which include compensation for having to deal with dead bodies and other difficult or unpleasant tasks, have been criticised.

Data revealed under the Freedom of Information Act shows rank-and-file officers making an average of £875 a year on top of their salaries and overtime.

The figures are published at a time when officers across Scotland are demanding a pay rise to make up for the 2.5% awarded this year.

Matthew Elliott, chief executive of the TaxPayers' Alliance campaign group, said: "This seems to be an extraordinary amount of money to give in bonuses at a time when there is apparently not enough money to honour even the basic police pay settlement.

There are also big differences in payments made by Scottish forces. While rank-and-file officers in Lothian and Borders received an average of £1037, their colleagues in Fife received just £273.

The different bonus schemes were introduced six years ago with the aim of improving efficiency and rewarding policemen and women with particularly difficult jobs.

Most of the payments to rank-and-file officers are Competence-related Threshold Payments (CRTPs) or Special Priority Payments (SPPs).

CRTPs are paid to officers who have reached the top of their pay scale for their rank and depends on them proving they are good at their job.

SPPs are paid to officers who have a particularly difficult job for their rank or have to work in demanding working environment, such as being regularly outside in bad weather.

Forces across Scotland also paid out more than £66,000 as part of a system called the Bonus Scheme, which does not include overtime payments.

This replaced and expanded on a historic payment system in which officers were paid for fingerprinting decomposed bodies - a payment that was abolished in 2003.

Now officers who have to carry out a wide range of unpleasant jobs or show particular dedication to duty can receive one-off payments of between £50 and £500.

Police association leaders also think the system is unfair.

Hugh Little, deputy general secretary of the Scottish Police Federation, criticised the introduction in 2002 of CRTPs, SPPs and bonus payments.

He said: "The Scottish Police Federation opposed the agreement partly because it felt the priority payments were unfair and divisive and, after five years in practice, many of our members still see th em as such."

Across the UK, forces paid out more than £155m in bonuses. Officers elsewhere in the UK fared slightly better than their Scottish colleagues - with each receiving an average of £938.

A spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland (Acpos) said: "Acpos does not have a viewpoint on the issue; the 2002 decision was part of the Police Negotiating Board process."

But Mike Craik, the chief constable of Northumbria Police and the workplace modernisation spokesman for Acpo in England and Wales, was prepared to criticise the system.

He said: "It's an inappropriate way of rewarding public services. Truthfully, bonuses do not have a place in the police service.

"We want to move to a system where you get paid according to your skills. That is what the future holds. As you learn and train and pass courses and get accredited, that is when you get the pay increment. "

Paul McKeever, chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales, said: "The current bonus system is divisive and unfair. The fairest mechanism of reward is to abolish the bonuses and special priority payments and have fairer national pay across the board.

"We will be continuing our fight with the government to ensure that police officers receive the very best pay deal possible, and not have to be reliant on ad hoc bonuses that some get, but the majority do not."