Pressure on police commissioner to tackle delays on 101 phone line
A SCRUTINY panel has called for an urgent review of the call handling system at North Yorkshire Police after concerns were raised about whether it was “fit for purpose”.
North Yorkshire Police and Crime Panel is putting pressure on the Police and Crime Commissioner for North Yorkshire, Julia Mulligan, following recent poor performance of the 101 service, which can be used to report nonurgent issues to the force.
At a meeting of the scrutiny board, panel members expressed concern after hearing reports some residents spent up to six hours on the phone waiting to speak to someone in the police’s control room and that some residents had either to abandon their call or consider calling the 999 emergency number instead.
Coun Carl Les, chairman of the panel and leader of North Yorkshire County Council, said: “The panel has taken a keen interest in the development of the 101 service for some time.
“While we have been supportive of recent improvements, the recent surge in call volumes requires urgent attention and we will be keeping this under review with the commissioner over the coming months.”
In response, Ms Mulligan said there had been a spike in call volumes to the 101 service between April and June, with demand rising by up to 20 per cent.
She said this was not purely an issue in North Yorkshire but that a similar trend has been seen in police forces nationwide, where calls to the 999 emergency service also rose sharply during this time.
The reasons for these increases were currently unclear, but the commissioner said Chief Constable Dave Jones was taking the issue very seriously, with work under way to investigate and to make sure that adequate resource was available.
Last week revealed South Yorkshire Police was also having major issues with its 101 line because people were using 999 to report minor incidents because they had run out of credit on their mobile phones.