We need 3,000 police recruits, say Lib Dems

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg will promise an extra 3,000 police officers as part of his party's crime-cutting proposals amid claims more than a third of forces have cut officer numbers since 2005 – including 308 in South Yorkshire.

It comes despite police leaders discussing yesterday suggestions they could save 500m by slashing 28,000 officers and replacing them with civilian staff.

Mr Clegg's pledge to put more bobbies on the beat comes after the Tories came under sustained attack from the Government for sending out figures which suggested violent crime had soared since 1997.

Home Secretary Alan Johnson has written to Tory leader David Cameron to demand the statistics are not used again because the Tories have overlooked warnings the figures for the periods before and after 2002 were not comparable because of a change in the way violent crime was recorded.

He insists that the British Crime Survey shows violent crime has fallen by 41 per cent since 1997.

Former Home Secretary Jacqui Smith raised the issue in the House of Commons and said the Tories had been "caught bang to rights issuing dodgy crime figures", and the Prime Minister claimed the Tories were not allowing a "fair debate".

The Tories' problems are compounded by their own former leader, Iain Duncan Smith, appearing to accept the practice was wrong, telling the BBC his Centre for Social Justice thinktank "has long understood the inaccuracy of directly comparing present crime levels with those published before the National Crime Recording Standard was introduced".

But Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling denied any wrongdoing, insisting the Home Office itself had used the same data set to draw comparisons on other issues.

Mr Grayling said: "There are certainly changes in the recording methods, but the point is that they are the only comparators available. They are published by the Home Office.

"We don't create crime figures. We use the official crime figures published by the Home Office. The Home Office has continued to use the same comparators."

Unveiling their proposals to boost police numbers today, the Liberal Democrats will claim they can fund the extra 3,000 officers by scrapping ID cards, which the party said would save 575m.

Mr Clegg said: "The Liberal Democrats are the only party that wants to cut crime by putting more police on the street. When only one in a hundred crimes ends up with a conviction in court, it is time for things to change."

The MP for Sheffield Hallam will visit a policing project in Durham, where numbers have declined by 11.1 per cent, proportionately more than anywhere else.

South Yorkshire has lost the most police – 308 – according to the figures, although total officer numbers in England and Wales increased during the same period from 142,795 to 144,833.

South Yorkshire chief constable Med Hughes has previously blamed falling Government funding for forcing cuts to be made.

But yesterday police leaders considered a discussion paper which said 400m could be saved by cutting 28,000 officers in England and Wales and using cheaper civilian staff instead.