Beds Police speak out about control room vacancies and 'poor' police response times in Leighton Buzzard

Bedfordshire Police has spoken out to address concerns about response times and control room vacancies.

At a meeting of Leighton-Linslade Town Council, councillors debated issues including the speed and quality of responses to 101 calls, and heard a report that there were "60 vacancies in the Bedfordshire Police control room".

Following a motion from Councillor Steve Owen, of Barnabas Ward, The White House is now calling upon the Chief Constable, Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC), and Bedfordshire MPs for "urgent" reassurance: that staffing is being addressed; that regular updates on control-room response are shared; of the guidelines being used to respond to differing types of crime; and that updates on response performance are published.

Chief Constable Trevor Rodenhurst has since told the LBO that he hopes to fill the vacancies "by the end of the financial year", while Andrew Selous MP has also contacted the force.

Bedfordshire Police told the LBO that the council has now received a full reply to its questions about police staffing assigned to Leighton Buzzard and Linslade, and the facilities and functions of the Bossard House police office – which the council claimed did not meet the PCC’s election promise.

Chief Constable Trevor Rodenhurst said: “We know how vital our force control room is as the first point of contact for our communities and spend around £5.5 million and employ more than 200 staff in that function to provide the best service we can.

"While we have a high number of vacancies at the moment, we hope to have these filled by the end of the financial year and are also using new technology to improve the service we provide. At the moment we also believe around 30 per cent of calls are non-police matters which are directed to other agencies.

“Response times for every police force are now published nationally and we will continue to publish this information and ensure our communities can scrutinise our work. The new police facility at Bossard House we hope will also provide quicker response times in Leighton Buzzard, allowing officers to stay in the town and complete tasks rather than having to return to stations elsewhere in the county.”

Andrew Selous MP said: “Police response times to incidents in Leighton Buzzard and Linslade remain a very great concern of mine. The problems go back to the disastrous decision taken in October 2012, that our local response officers should book on and off their shifts at Luton police station.

"This is wrong, unfair and needs to change. I have raised this with our new Chief Constable Trevor Rodenhurst and his expectation is that when the current 400 student police officers become more experienced over the next year, we will see more of our record number of police officers in Bedfordshire, based in town, which is what we need and deserve. The new police hub in the town will help facilitate this."

The LBO also contacted the PCC's office for a comment, but did not receive a response by the time of going to press.