Payments of £25 are to be made to everyone who takes part in public meetings on Thames Valley Police Authority's next annual policing plan.

It agreed to make the payments after a recruiting agency said it would help attract an audience to get feedback on the policing plan and best value performance plan for 2002/3. The police authority has a statutory duty to carry out community consultation and discussions will start later this year.

It will hold meetings, lasting about three hours, in each of the force's ten policing areas with the audience being made up of invited members of the public and local groups.

The audience will be selected by the police authority and their community partners, assisted by a recruitment agency.

The police authority has already spent £40,000 buying 100 electronic voting handsets - similar to that used on ITV's hit game show Who wants to be a Millionaire? - for use in consultation meetings.

The first round will be held in June or July. There would then be further discussions in the autumn which would take into account the feedback from the initial meetings.

The findings would be gathered together and presented to three meetings later in the year.