WEST Yorkshire Police insists it is committed to roads policing despite seeing a 50 per cent reduction in traffic officers last year.

The number of specialist roads officers in the county was slashed by half almost three-quarters in some parts of England and Wales last year.

The total number of specialist road officers across all 43 forces in England and Wales fell from 5,237 to 4,934, according to data released by policing minister Brandon Lewis in response to a parliamentary question.

West Yorkshire Police - which runs Operation Steerside in Bradford - saw the third biggest reduction.

A spokesman for West Yorkshire Police said: “Since 2010, West Yorkshire has lost over 1,000 police officers and 2,000 police staff.

"Road safety remains an important policing service but the cuts have required us to re-organise our force structure to move from having specialist teams such as roads policing, firearms and dogs, to more flexible mixed speciality based units in our Safer Roads and Neighbourhood Support teams.

"On a daily basis the safer roads officers provide support to colleagues in districts and coverage of the motorway network.

“SRANS is split into geographically based teams with 210 constables, 25 sergeants and five inspectors. There are plans in place to increase that number by a further 25 officer posts.

“We recorded 9,206 offences relating to the use of a mobile phone whilst driving in the last three years, with 3,631 offences recorded in 2016, 901 more than in 2015 and 846 more than in 2014, demonstrating the force’s commitment to tackling the issue.”

Mark Burns-Williamson, West Yorkshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner, said: “Keeping our roads safe remains a key priority for me, West Yorkshire Police and our partners.

“These cuts have changed the way West Yorkshire Police tackle road safety, moving to a more flexible approach as part of Safer Roads and Neighbourhood Support teams, as we rebuild numbers through officer recruitment.

“I have now set a budget for 2017/18 which allows the recruitment of around 500 police officers and protection of PCSO numbers which will provide a further increase of policing resources for our communities throughout the next 12 months.”

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