New police chief says budget cuts will be biggest challenge

Justine Curran, 45, who took over from former chief Tim Hollis this month, said the difficulty would be minimising the impact of the cuts on the level of service provided to the public.

“The budget stuff is huge, like in every area of the public sector,” she said.

“We have already taken out £20m and we’ve got to take out another £20m by 2018. It’s a significant challenge whilst keeping the level of service we deliver to the public as good as it can be.”

The force currently has fewer officers than at any other time in its history and has announced plans to save another £500,000 by scrapping its mounted section. Forces nationally have make £2.4bn of cuts by 2015.

But Ms Curran said she had inherited a force that was well placed to meet the challenges ahead. “I think we are in a really good, solid place,” she said.

“We’ve had a 34 per cent crime reduction over the last five years and last year’s continued that and we were better than the national average in a lot of areas. The challenge is how do we move to the next level, where are we going in meeting our financial challenges and meeting the ambition in the police and crime plan.”

She also announced plans to make more use of social media to communicate and interact with the public.

She said: “It’s about offering more choices to people. It’s not about us saying we won’t come and see you, it’s about us saying how do you want us to get back to you. If you do your shopping online or book a hotel room they send you a text.

“You might want face-to-face meetings or you might say no stress and get an email. It’s about us trying to get a bit smarter with how people contact us and how we interact with them.”