Cambridgeshire police chief confirms Peterborough station to close

Sir Graham Bright took up office in November 2012

Cambridgeshire's Police and Crime Commissioner has announced he will close a police station and a number of other buildings may be sold.

Conservative Sir Graham Bright, said it was important to "rationalise" the buildings, including the closure of the Bridge Street station in Peterborough.

The force needs to make savings of £19.3m by the end of 2019-20.

In his draft annual report, Sir Graham said he had balanced the budget while protecting front-line services.

The PCC, whose office is in charge of managing the force's £35m estate, said the decision to close the station was made as part of a move to centralise the force's car servicing operations, some of which takes place at Bridge Street.

"There will still be a police presence, obviously, in Peterborough, but we do have to rationalise," Sir Graham said.

'Turbulent year'

"Some of the bigger office complexes can be scaled down because technology means officers do not have to go back to base to file paperwork."

Some of the smaller stations which are no longer used, such as Bottisham, are also likely to be sold off, he said.

"It's wrong to have these places sitting there costing us money."

His annual report for 2014-15 said the force had faced a year of "tough funding challenges" but had managed to balance the budget and save almost £5m while keeping the same number of uniformed police officers.

Describing it as "another turbulent year financially", he added: "We are on top of it, we are saving money and I fully believe that we can continue as we have to keep our front-line and to save the money that we need to save."