West Midlands Police Chief is allowed to retire, NOT sacked

[HappyFace2025]

As thread title - he keeps his full pension.
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/01/16/maccabi-tel-aviv-israeli-fan-ban-craig-guildford-foster/

And the man who refused to sack him - Simon Foster
www.thetimes.com/uk/crime/article/police-commissioner-in-israeli-fan-row-offered-mosque-blank-cheque-739qpcc07

What a surprise.

Why should he have been sacked? What exactly did he do that merited dismissal? And I don't just mean in some hack journalist's "opinion" I mean in contravention of the law or his terms of employment.

If you look at his record, he was a pretty good Chief Constable.

Because he lied, knowingly, to both the public and MPs.

I think he should have been sacked.

😆 🤣 😂

Because he lied, knowingly, to both the public and MPs.

It’s insane that people are trying to justify this!

Do you have any basic employment law knowledge?

He's been awarded his full pension which will be extremely healthy. He should not have had that option by retiring. It was gross misconduct, therefore a sackable offence.

I'm waiting for Dave Hinton, South-East Water, to be allowed to do the same. Again lied. And of course the Post Office people - now that should be jail time, not just sacking.

yep, same old same old.

He would have kept his pension, even if sacked. Pension forfeiture happens in only a tiny number of cases. I can understand people thinking he has ‘got away with it’ but I think it is the right decision. It could take years to bring misconduct proceedings to sack him, keeping him on full pay whilst suspended, and this way he leaves promptly. What would dismissing him achieve? His reputation has been damaged already.

Exactly this. It’s right he’s resigned and it’s also right he keeps his pension. He’s been in the police service for over 30 years and was a recipient of the Queen’s Medsl. An inglorious end to a career is punishment enough. Sacking is difficult ( rightly so) and always expensive -especially as mistakes are often made which lead to it being judged unfair. Ed Bslls jumped on that bandwagon and it cost the local authority a fortune.

Why do you think he shouldn’t keep his pension? Do you know how these things work?

Seriously?

BTW, if you want to be exact, police officers aren’t strictly speaking employees: they’re office holders. But it makes no real difference. He should obviously have been booted out by the PCC. It’s even more scandalous that the PCC waded in to support him against the Commons committee.

But either way Guildford’s fully entitled to his pension.

For gross misconduct, with no pay out

What do you mean by ‘pay out’?

Pension probably.

Meanwhile he has made no apology in today's statement for the failings in the published report that has led to (finally) his resignation.
He has brought the role of West Midlands Police into disrepute.

Pension isn’t a payout and being sacked doesn’t automatically equate to forfeiting your pension - and nor should it

The UK (still) operates under the rule of law - not mob justice based on a couple of lines read in social media.
Confiscating a pension accrued over many years of service happens in only the rarest of cases and requires a whole legal process to justify it.

It's the lying, not to me as a tax payer, but to Parliament, regulators, committees. That has to stop. And how do you get it to stop? These are senior professionals. There are codes of conduct. You need to penalise. I worked in a regulated industry for years. Enough is enough.

The UK (still) operates under the rule of law

Which is why senior police lying isn’t a good look.

based on a couple of lines read in social media

wasn’t his excuse similar? The AI was wrong.

Yet it was mob justice sought at the Villa match.

Why would he lose his pension? No one who is sacked does.

its a tenuous link that sounds all hard arse and I’M A TAXPAYER but is totally irrelevant.

i imagine the humiliation will be quite enough punishment for most people

Yes he’s lost his job and his reputation and almost certainly the possibility of various opportunities he’d have had if he’d retired in normal circumstances. That’s plenty of retribution. Of course he had to be held accountable and he has been. Or perhaps there should have been a public hanging?