Merging forces will bring benefits, says the federation (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

Merging forces will bring benefits, says the federation

WILTSHIRE'S police authority will have to show that amalgamating the county's force with one or more of its neighbours will produce real benefits for local people, says the Police Federation.

County organiser Phil Davenport told the Gazette that the federation, which represents officers of all ranks, would not oppose changes if they would result in improving services.

The suggestion that Wiltshire Constabulary might end its 166 years of independence came out of a report by the HM Inspector of Constabulary, which recommended optimum force sizes of between 3,000 and 5,000 officers, suggesting Wiltshire, with 1,228, is too small to be effective against major incidents.

Mr Davenport said: "On the face of it, it is very difficult to have any strong objections to the report. There may be opportunities in amalgamating forces which would put more into the areas of policing identified by the HMIC."

The report particularly mentioned coping with a major terrorist attack and tackling cross-county crime, such as distraction burglaries, which are often carried out by gangs who travel many miles in a day.

Mr Davenport added: "From a local perspective, the police service would continue to perform at a very high level, but it is going to have to be demonstrated that any merger would produce perceived benefits to the local community."

Mr Davenport said he was most concerned about local policing, which in some measure has now been taken over by Police Community Service Officers (PCSOs).

He said: "It will be interesting to see how neighbourhood policing would operate. If the PCSOs' role is to be expanded, it may distance ordinary police officers from the community they serve, and we wouldn't want that."

Mr Davenport said there was nothing in the report to say that police numbers were likely to drop in the event of a merger and, because the sizes of forces was described in terms of numbers of officers, he felt that it was unlikely that redundancies would occur.

The loss of local contact if the centre of operations moved out of the county need not result, he said. "It would be down to how the basic command unit, in our case the policing divisions, would be maintained," he said.

Mr Davenport added: "In three months time we will have a better picture of what's proposed. We may find ourselves singing from the same hymn sheet and things may progress a lot more quickly than we anticipated."

Wiltshire Chief Constable Martin Richards and police authority chairman Bertie Woolnough met Home Secretary Charles Clarke last week and they have been given three months to come up with convincing reasons to prevent the merger.

The report drawn up by HM Inspectorate of Constabulary studied the role of Britain's 43 police forces. It said smaller forces are unable to cope with large incidents, such as terrorist attacks, and that too many services are needlessly duplicated or are carried out to varying standards.

Mr Clarke wants the number reduced to nearer 20, which means smaller forces may have to merge.

Wiltshire will have to produce a report by the end of the year with its own proposals on how it can improve efficiency and work closer with neighbouring forces.

The force will have to work hard to convince Mr Clarke, who is said to be ''very keen'' on a merger, that Wiltshire should stay independent.

Mr Richards said last week the next three months will be vital for the force.

"It is too early to speculate on any new structures at this time, but Wiltshire Police will fully engage in this process,'' he said.

"We know from consultation with our communities that the people of Wiltshire value greatly their local police force and local policing, locally delivered.

The Gazette asked a number of people if they were worried about the merger and if they feared a larger force would be less in tune with the local community.