A NATIONAL campaign has been launched to highlight the importance of rural policing.

National Rural Crime Network research due to be published in October shows trust in policing in the countryside is much lower than in urban areas.

Network chairman Julia Mulligan, who is also police and crime commissioner for North Yorkshire, said: “Only one-third of people living or working in rural areas believe the police are responding to issues of concern to them compared to two thirds nationally. Rural crime is also significantly under-reported.”

A detailed government review of existing arrangements has concluded that the current model for allocating core government grant funding to the police in England and Wales, the Police Allocation Formula, is complex, opaque and out of date.

The government believes the formula should be replaced by a simplified model, and has launched a consultation seeking views on the principles underpinning this model, with a view to implementation for the 2016/17 financial year.

It also invites views on a number of important decisions including how to transition from the current approach to the new model and proposes a further simplification in the way in which legacy council tax grants are managed.

The network is urging the Government to reconsider proposed changes to how police forces are funded, and is encouraging people to respond to the government consultation and flag up any fears. Hampshire’s PCC and Chief Constable Andy Marsh have urged the public to respond before the deadline.

Concern has been voiced by representatives of rural communities that without proper resourcing for rural police forces, some crimes and anti-social behaviour might not get the attention they deserve. The network believes that if the government doesn’t sufficiently recognise the needs of rural people, and therefore rural policing, that trust will only diminish.

It argues a proposed new funding formula fails to take into account the unit-cost of policing a rural area.

It objects that the funding formula also fails to reflect the majority of work the police do which is not crime-related, such as road safety or responding to welfare issues, and is encouraging as many rural residents as possible to respond to a government consultation on the issue.

The network urges that the new police funding formula should recognise the “inbuilt complexities” of dealing with crime in isolated rural areas and is launching a rural policing matters petition.

Campaign supporters are asked to make their voices heard both by responding directly to the Government’s consultation at gov.uk, and to sign the network’s rural policing matters petition at rsnonline.org.uk.