Liberal Democrats slam waste of Police time

4.21.47pm GMT Thu 13th Jul 2006

Kathy Pollard, Suffolk County Council Lib Dem Leader talks to local police

Liberal Democrats on Suffolk County Council today accused the Government of wasting Police time, as it announced it would be abandoning the proposals to merge police forces. The proposals, which would have seen the current 43 forces merging to create a smaller number of super-forces across the country, had been controversial from the beginning. Many critics raised questions over how much the whole project would cost the public, with estimates ranging from 17 million to 35 million per force.

Liberal Democrat Councillor Dave Wood, Vice Chair of Suffolk Police Authority, said, "I'm very pleased the Government has come to its senses at last and decided to scrap these ridiculous and unwanted plans. What John Reid has discovered is what we as a Police Authority have been saying all along: the sums just don't add up. I can't help but wonder how much Police time and effort, both in the Constabulary and the Authority, has been wasted in preparing and researching these mergers; staff have been diverted from their important work on collaboration projects, which have shown real results, and from implementing the neighbourhood policing agenda.

If the Government really want to deal with cross border criminality, the reason the mergers were proposed in the first place, they would be much better investigating the possibility of regional crime squads. These squads could deal with the problems the police face without the upheaval and cost of the proposed mergers."