Tom Constantine is overseeing policing reforms

North Belfast MP Nigel Dodds said money used to pay the policing oversight commissioner would have been better spent on health or education.

He said Tom Constantine, who is monitoring police reform in Northern Ireland, has been paid almost �200,000 since his appointment in 2000.

The anti-Agreement former minister for social development said the money should have been spent on other issues.

"This is but the latest example of the profligate use of public money in bolstering the various institutions and offices which derive from the Belfast Agreement," he said.

However, the Northern Ireland Office insisted Mr Constantine has provided good value for money.

Government records show Mr Constantine has spent 99 days in Northern Ireland carrying progress checks, but a NIO spokesman said he had spent more than 300 days working in his role as Oversight Commissioner.

"Over two-thirds of this is spent in the US, writing his reports and working on his brief," he said.

"Mr Constantine's fee compares favourably with what a consultant of his calibre might expect."

Former Canadian police officer Al Hutchinson will succeed Mr Constantine as oversight commissioner later this year.

The commissioner monitors how changes to the new police service are carried out, based on the government's policing reform act, put together following a report from the Patten Commission.