Opposition Leader Michael Dunkley last night called on Government and Police to “get off their butts” and sort out a long-running dispute over pay.

The Shadow Public Safety Minister said both sides were to blame for stalled negotiations over a rise for officers. “Intransigence is like dancing the tango,” he said. “It takes two.”

Mr. Dunkley spoke out after Public Safety Minister David Burch accused him of using the pay row to try to score political points when he accused the Government at the weekend of treating Police officers contemptuously. Sen. Burch said on Monday: “The Opposition is clearly not in possession of the full facts of this situation and the Ministry of Public Safety and Housing will not be drawn into a debate on an issue that the Opposition is clearly trying to use to score political points.”

Mr. Dunkley said yesterday that the fact that the salary dispute — which will now go to arbitration — dated back two years and would not be resolved before the Police’s 2005-2007 contract expired, showed that Government was “being careless and inefficient to the point of being contemptuous of those with whom they are negotiating”.

He added: “This isn’t a delay of a few months; it’s a delay amounting to years. I suppose what the Minister means is that the Police are giving his negotiating team a hard time. Maybe they are, but intransigence is like dancing the tango - it takes two.

“I think both sides need to get off their butts and get it sorted out. The Police and the community doesn’t need the stress of having this kind of unresolved problem hanging over our heads.

“If the Minister has such great respect for the Police and the work they do, then I suggest that it’s in his best interest to resolve this matter as soon as possible. The arbitration to which these talks have been referred needs to happen quickly and both sides need to be absolutely determined to make it work.”

According to Friday’s edition of the Mid-Ocean News, the Police Association held an emergency meeting last week over stalled salary negotiations and delays on a new station for Hamilton to replace the condemned building on Parliament Street.

The Royal Gazette’s sister paper said it understood officers were requesting a rise of around two percent above that on offer.