Spending Review: Council tax payers could pay more for policing

The Chancellor promised police forces would receive a real-terms increase amounting to £900 million.

He told MPs that crime had fallen over the last five years despite predictions that cuts in funding would have the opposite effect.

But he said now was “not the time for further police cuts”.

“Now is the time to back our police and give them the tools do the job,” he said.

Mr Osborne said police were “on the front line of the fight to keep us safe.”

He continued. “The police protect us, and we’re going to protect the police.”

However, taxpayers in some areas could find themselves paying more towards the cost of their local force.

Police and crime commissioners can currently only increase their part of the council tax bill by up to two per cent without triggering a local referendum.

The Autumn Statement and Spending Review included a promise to “give police and crime commissioners greater flexibility in raising local precepts in areas where they have been historically low.”

South Yorkshire Police and Crime Commissioner Dr Alan Billings said: “The message seems to have got through that numbers had already been reduced to levels that were frankly getting near a tipping point. However, the government still does not recognise the way the demand on the police service is changing.

“Overall crime has gone down, but the crimes that are going up are more serious, organised and complex and require greater not fewer resources to solve.”