Mixed reactions from Police and Crime Commissioners to league tables

League tables published by the Home Office ranked West Midlands Police as the fifth worst for answering emergency calls, while Staffordshire was ranked the ninth worst in the country.

The league tables have provoked strong responses from both Police and Crime Commissioners, with Staffordshire commissioner Ben Adams saying the ranking was no surprise to him.

However, his counterpart in the West Midlands, Simon Foster, was more direct about the figures, saying they did not recognise the complexity or quality of the calls that came in.

Mr Adams said: "When people contact the police, they expect their calls to be answered quickly, for the police to respond rapidly and to deal effectively with the issues that matter to them, and I understand their concerns when the service sadly falls short of the mark.

“As Commissioner, improving the performance of the 999 service is an absolute priority for me, and ensuring that the people of Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent receive a high-quality, timely response is at the very heart of my Police & Crime Plan.

“Today’s ranking comes as no surprise to me – I hold regular performance meetings with the force’s new Chief Constable Chris Noble, and am reassured that he is also committed to providing the best possible service for our communities.

“Under his leadership, significant work is already underway to deliver a series of activities to address this issue head on, and I will continue to monitor progress to ensure that the work he is driving remains on track.”

Mr Foster, said: “We simply do not have enough officers and staff working for West Midlands Police. West Midlands Police gets more calls per 1,000 of the population than anywhere else in the country, including London.

“The government cut 2,221 police officers – 25% of our police officers - and hundreds of police staff from West Midlands Police during austerity. We will only have 1,200 of those police officers back by 2023.

“To deal with record numbers of emergency 999 calls, 40 further staff are due to be put into call handling to support the hard working and dedicated team.

"850 dedicated staff and officers work in the Force Contact department, and further additions will have to be balanced against other under pressure departments also dealing with record demand.

“As well as receiving more calls per head of population than any other force in the country, the number of complex calls we are receiving is at the top end too.

"This means handlers are often on calls for longer than other forces dealing with difficult incidents.

“The government’s league table is flawed because it does not recognise the complexity of the calls received and it certainly doesn’t take account of the quality of the calls either.

"All that is measured is how quick the phone is picked up, not even whether someone has to call back later to resolve their situation.”