Jeff Carruthers

In May 2018 Jeff Carruthers was appointed as Chief Finance Officer.

Jeff is a qualified accountant a member of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance (CIPFA) and Accountancy and The Association of Accounting Technicians (AAT). Having worked for Warwickshire County Council for the early part of his career Jeff gained wide-ranging experience in variety roles both in a central finance team and working directly with the front line service providers including head teachers, social workers and engineers, at the forefront of devolved financial management.

Jeff joined Warwickshire Police in 1997 as Systems Accountant and given the task of implementing a year 2000 (Y2K) compliant finance system. He subsequently took up roles that involved financial and business planning, budgeting and preparing the annual statement of accounts during a period of substantial change in Warwickshire Police, national policing, and the area of technical accounting and governance. Jeff was seconded to the team that prepared the business case for the proposed merger of the four regional forces; he was the finance lead for the tragic fire in a warehouse in Atherstone on Stour South Warwickshire where four of colleagues in the fire services tragically lost their lives. More recently he has worked on developing the accounting arrangements for Police and Crime Commissioners (PCC) and Chief Constables following the creation of the PCC and the financial accounting arrangements for the alliance. He holds a role on the national Police Pensions Board governing pension schemes administered by Kier Business Services Ltd. He has also support the National College of Policing to deliver the Senior Leadership Programme and is an active volunteer on the CIPFA 6^th Form Management Team Games which aims to develop students financial and management skills using a real live scenario.

In April 2013 Jeff took up the role of Head of Accountancy and Financial Services for the alliance and in May 2018 was appointed to the new role of the Chief Finance Officer which carries statutory responsibilities as the Chief Finance Officer to the two Chief Constable's of Warwickshire Police and West Mercia Police.

Jeff has led the finance team through significant change including the formation of the alliance and consolidating the finance team on one site using a single finance system, common policies and harmonised financial arrangements, whilst reducing the core finance team by 50%.

It is Jeff's ambition to support the people in the Finance Directorate to be the best they can be. Both he and the team are committed to delivering cost effective financial services, ensuring there is appropriate financial control and seeking out greater efficiencies to increase our front line capacity and protect people from harm.