Kent Police is involved in a legal tussle over a multi-million pound Private Finance Initiative for its North Kent Police Station, it has emerged.

The force is involved in a complex dispute that is related to a contract it had with the contractors costing about £5.5m a year to cover service charges and managing facilities.

Kent Police had argued that the consortium, Justice Support Services, was not meeting the terms of the contract and since last March had withheld payments and is trying to end the contract 13 years early.

The dispute became more complicated when the consortium went into administration, leaving the force to negotiate a settlement with the company AlixPartners which has taken on the management of the building. It has been approached to comment.

A Kent Police spokesman confirmed: “The force is currently in dispute with the administrators of the PFI company about a range of issues and has reserved all of its rights including its rights to terminate the PFI contract for contractor default. We continue to work with the administrators and the Home Office to resolve all of the issues in dispute.”

It has been reported that if there was an agreement reached, it could cost the force several million pounds by way of compensation. The station was opened in an out-of-town location in Northfleet in 2008 and has the joint largest custody suite.

The force recently announced Kent Police is planning to return to its 80-year-old headquarters in Maidstone after deciding to leave three years ago. The force had planned to sell off the site to generate funds from its sale.

But with the number of officers now being the highest in the force's history, it has decided to return to its Sutton Road HQ.

The site at Northfleet will instead be used for "other operational policing purposes" as well as partly being leased for commercial income,