Boost to police numbers

12.00.37pm UTC (GMT +0000) Wed 27th Jul 2005

At the meeting of the Police community Consultative Group in York House on Tuesday, Chief Superintendent Edwards expressed satisfaction that the borough was getting its "fair share" of police within the Met. He point to figures which showed that the boroughs frontline operational staff had risen from 271 in April 2002 to 337 in the April-June period of this year, an increase of 66 with support staff rising from 54 to 64 and senior management from 7 to 10. The Chief Superintendent explained that this expansion had made possible the role out of safer neighbourhood teams across the borough.

Over this three year period most 'volume' crime had stabilised (motor vehicle crime, burglary) though there had been a doubling of robbery.

Vincent Cable, who is also vice chair of the All Party Police Group in parliament, said he welcomed the build up of police numbers after the "catastrophic decline of the 1990's" but said that a substantial part of the increase was accounted for by PCSO's which are not separately Identified in the statistics: "PCSOs are a valuable addition to the police family but they are not police officers and they should not be treated inter changeably. The other element in the statistics, which can be misleading, is that it tells us nothing about availability of officers as opposed to their numbers. We know that many officers are 'abstracted' into central London and, understandably, that is a major factor in the current emergency. There is also a continued frustration, even in safer neighbourhood areas like Whitton, that while more local police are available they often are not around, on the streets, when trouble occurs in the late evening. Overall the story is a positive one but there is some way to go before the borough can be said to be adequately policed".