Warning over anti-terror police

The huge counter-terrorism effort is placing an unsustainable strain on Britain’s wider policing service, one of the country’s most senior officers will warn today.

Sara Thornton, the head of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, will say the “flat cash” funding settlement for forces announced by ministers two years ago is no longer enough.

Hundreds of specialist counter-terrorism officers have been assigned to massive inquiries launched in the wake of each of the five attacks to hit the UK this year.