Demand forces Staffordshire Police to take on 30 extra call handlers

Staffordshire Police is expecting call numbers to increase further in the summer

Staffordshire Police has taken on an extra 30 call handlers to keep up with growing demand.

It said it has seen a series of record-breaking days for 999 calls and it had also seen an increasing number of non-emergency 101 calls.

The force said it has one of the lowest number of call handlers in the country, compared to other police forces with similar demand levels.

Despite this, it said 999 answer-times have "improved significantly".

The force said it received 879 calls to 999 on 13 May and 970 calls on 20 May.

In June, there were five days when Staffordshire Police received more than 900 calls to 999 and on 24 June it received 1,004 calls.

In April, the average time to answer 999 calls was 11 seconds compared to 23 seconds overall in the past 12 months, the force said.

The growing number of calls was seen across all 10 of its local policing areas, it added.

The force also introduced a triage system for calls in June 2022, to divert calls away from 101 if other agencies or individual officers could deal with the issues more effectively.

This resulted in more than half of calls being dealt with without going to 101, they added.

With the extra staff, the force said it would expand this system.

Chief Constable Chris Noble said the investment "means that we will have extra staff available during the busiest summer peak in demand".