ANGRY residents feel local police are failing them with often as few as TEN officers on patrol to cover the whole of Blackpool.

That's ONE officer for every 15,300 people!

And outside Blackpool, residents of Poulton, Thornton and Lytham also say they never see the police, with response times sometimes reaching three hours.

Local MP Hilton Dawson is calling for more officers in these areas after a series of meetings during which he found residents in these so called "sleepy" towns were getting increasingly concerned about the lack of proper policing.

"Some of these places are extremely lovely towns where people do not feel safe from vandals and disorder.

"It is the fear of crime that needs to be tackled in this sort of situation."

Some feel that the targeting of so-called crime "hot spots" means that many people are not getting the kind of community policing that they need.

Revoe resident association member Isabel Harkness said that many people have given up on expecting action from the police and started dealing with matters themselves.

"I saw a drug deal taking place at the end of my road and so I called the police," she said.

"It was more than three hours before an officer turned up who took some details and nothing more was heard.

"In the end we had to do something about the dealers in the area." And this is the first in a catalogue of incidents that the residents' association has told the Citizen.

In Poulton, off licence worker Audrey Robb feels that with two nightclubs, numerous pubs and increasing numbers of youths collecting in the square, a show of police presence is necessary.

"The other week I phoned for the police at 4.40pm, but it was seven o'clock before anyone arrived.

"I can see the police station from the shop, but there is no one there at night. We have the right to feel safe and I think that there is not enough police presence in the area."

Inspector Andrew Perry, responsible for Cleveleys and Poulton, would not confirm the exact number of officers policing the area but said they didn't have the resources to put a bobby on the beat.

"I have to be very careful what I do with the officers I am responsible for," he said. "The community bobby on the street does reduce crime and reassure people in the town that they are safe, but in this day and age I cannot waste resources when there are other crimes that need tackling."

Supt Mike Cunningham of West division, the force covering Blackpool and the Fylde, was reluctant to give an exact figure of the number of police on patrol in Blackpool, but said that they could use more officers.

"It is hard to give an average figure for the number of officers as it very much relies on the time of day and the demand," said Supt Cunningham.

"At six in the morning, which is not a time of high demand there can be only two. We have to manage our resource to targeting the areas where crime is highest."

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