Ontario Provincial Police will not lay charges in its year-long investigation into alleged misconduct in the handling of the RCMP insurance plan, the provincial force said Wednesday in a statement.

RCMP Commissioner William Elliott requested that the OPP launch an investigation into the administration and outsourcing of the insurance plan in March 2008.

The OPP probe followed a previous RCMP internal audit and criminal investigation by the Ottawa Police Service, as well as Auditor General Sheila Fraser's report in 2006 that found millions of dollars in inappropriate charges to the RCMP's pension and insurance plans.

"At the conclusion of the investigation, it was determined no reasonable grounds existed to warrant criminal or regulatory charges," the OPP statement said.

The pension scandal erupted in 2003 with allegations of mismanagement of funds, nepotism in hiring, questionable expense claims, payments to consultants who did little or no work and other contracting irregularities by civilian members of the police force administering the plans between 2000 and 2003.

During their testimony before a House of Commons public accounts committee in March 2007, three senior RCMP officers accused a number of their superiors, including then commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli, of engaging in a coverup after the officers made allegations of wrongdoing regarding the insurance and pension funds.

In the wake of the scandal, the federal government asked an independent investigator, Toronto lawyer David Brown, to review the case.

Brown released a scathing report in June 2007, declaring that the culture and management of the RCMP were "horribly broken." He noted that whistleblowers within the force had come forward to complain of wrongdoing, only to be punished for their efforts.

But Brown said he found no evidence of a coverup by Zaccardelli, who later resigned after admitting he gave incorrect testimony on the Maher Arar affair to a Commons committee.

In a second report released in December, Brown recommended the RCMP be completely overhauled and turned into an entity separate from the federal government overseen by a civilian board of managers.

In March 2008, then public safety minister Stockwell Day appointed a group to oversee sweeping changes to the RCMP based on Brown's recommendations.

With files from the Canadian Press