Moat cop's fury at May - The Sun

THE hero cop blinded by killer Raoul Moat confronted Theresa May yesterday over police pay.

PC David Rathband spoke out as the Home Secretary faced cops' fury at the Police Federation conference.

Speaking via video-link, PC Rathband - who suffered horrific injuries when Moat blasted him in the face last July - asked Mrs May: "I was paid 35,000 last year. Do you think I'm paid too much?"

Mrs May replied: "I'm not sitting here saying to any individual officer your pay is wrong."

PC Rathband's powerful intervention came as a string of cops hit out at Government plans to slash police budgets by a fifth.

Delegates accused Mrs May of betraying the police and her speech was greeted with silence.

Mrs May faced ridicule when she tried to defend big increases in the foreign aid budget.

There was mocking laughter when she declared: "If you get aid right in certain parts of the world, such as Pakistan, it will reduce the possibility of terrorism on the streets of the UK."

One delegate - Sarah Adams from Derbyshire - got a standing ovation when she accused the Tories of breaking their pledge to "back the police".

She added: "Home Secretary, how can you expect police officers and the communities we serve to ever trust you or this Government again?"

Mrs May insisted: "It's not my job to duck the difficult decisions and to tell you what you want to hear."

Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said Mrs May's speech "shows she is still in denial about the damage her policies are causing to police forces and communities".