DISAPPOINTMENT was voiced by Surrey Police and Crime Commissioner Kevin Hurley after the force was rated “requires improvement” in the latest official efficiency report.

Some police forces in England and Wales may not be able to withstand further cuts because they are not efficient enough, HM Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) 2015 Police Efficiency Inspection report, has warned.

Surrey Police has cut its spending by 14 per cent since 2010, which is significantly lower than the England and Wales average. HMIC reported the force was “in transition” when it inspected in April.

“It recognises that its current workforce model is not affordable and is reviewing part of its operating model through the ‘policing your neighbourhood’ programme,” the report stated.

“The force plans a new way of providing neighbourhood and emergency response policing by April 2016 and, to prepare for this, is maintaining high levels of vacancies in frontline posts.

“The existing operating model therefore has to deliver the same level of services with significantly fewer staff. At the point of inspection, this approach was creating undue pressures on the organisation and on staff.

“HMIC found evidence of an adverse effect on the service to the public in some areas of policing.”

HMIC reported that five years into the cutbacks programme, Surrey did not “properly match its resources to its demand” and the new IT system it planned to address the problem was not yet in place.

Deploying staff is one aspect of matching resources to demand and HMIC found staff were not always effectively deployed to prioritise which non-emergency calls to attend and which officer was most suitable and nearest. In one case, a long-standing parking dispute was given higher priority than more important police calls.

Staff expressed concern at the lack of resources to respond to demand, which was seen by HMIC when visiting the control room. Surrey is not meeting its aspiration to arrive at 82 per cent of emergency incidents within 15 minutes. Its performance in April was 76.4 per cent. Answering routine 101 calls from the public within 60 seconds was only achieved 57 per cent of the time.

More victims of crime were satisfied with their force in Surrey at 85.7 per cent from March 2014 to March 2015 than nationally at 83.8 per cent. HMIC found Surrey had successfully reduced spending over the last four years while largely protecting its frontline services and crime had reduced by 20 per cent since 2010.

While Surrey was judged as requiring improvement overall, its financial position was rated good. The report noted business plans to make savings assessed at £9.5million had been approved, which is £1.2million more than the required target of £8.3million in the current financial year.

Mr Hurley said: “The inspection found that while the force did have a sustainable financial plan it hadn’t at the time fully assessed and understood the changes in policing demand or put plans in place to address that demand.

“While I am disappointed that these plans weren’t in place for the HMIC inspection, I have in the last week received copies of plans that Surrey Police are putting in place from April 2016, including a new neighbourhood policing model.

“These plans put Surrey Police in a much better position to meet budgetary constraints, however, we shouldn’t underestimate the challenge facing us over the next few years to continue to make savings while responding to increases in reports of complex crimes such as rape, domestic violence, child abuse and cybercrime.”

Responding to the report findings, Surrey Chief Constable Lynne Owens said: “I’m disappointed that the HMIC assessment was made while we were in the process of a comprehensive review and restructure and therefore doesn’t take that into account in its assessment.

“Our project, which was started well before the inspection, aimed to fully understand the changing types of requests and levels of demands currently being made on the organisation and redesign our services to respond to these new challenges.

“To do this properly meant we needed to take the time to collect the detail and make well evidenced decisions, rather than just slashing frontline services or officer and staff numbers.

“It is perplexing that this sophisticated approach to understanding what we need now, what capability we need in the future and designing our services and workforce to meet this is exactly what HMIC are praising as good practice nationally.

“Our plans completely address the recommendations that HMIC now make about ensuring funds and our workforce are allocated to the areas where they are most needed.

“I am confident that our plans are robust and will mean we are fit for the financial and changing crime challenges we are facing now and into the future.”