POLICE in Lancashire claim colleagues are being unfairly prosecuted for alleged offences that members of the public would be allowed to get away with.

The accusations, which mostly involve motoring matters, have prompted a call for the Crown Prosecution Service to stop singling out officers.

Offences at the centre of the dispute are usually relatively minor, where discretion is used in making the decision on whether to prosecute.

But members of the Police Federation, which represents rank and file officers, have said they want to be treated the same as everyone else.

They claim current practices mean a motorist whose car crashes into a wall, without injuring anyone or hitting another vehicle, may escape prosecution.

But the Traffic officer who attends the incident may be prosecuted if he commits an identical driving error.

Police Federation members have now called on their bosses to seek assurances from the Crown Prosecution Service that they will not single out police officers for special treatment. Lancashire branch chairman Paul Marsh, said: "We have had people who have been concerned about this matter, in relation to motoring offences.

"Police officers driving police vehicles have been subjected to the full weight of the Road Traffic Act when members of the public might not have been. If the Road Traffic Act is going to be applied, it should be applied across the board.

"But common sense goes out of the window in a lot of cases. We are just asking to be treated the same as anybody else."

A spokesman for the CPS said: "In every case referred to the CPS, the decision to prosecute is applied using the criteria set out by the Code for Crown Prosecutors.

"Prosecutors use the code firstly to decide whether there is enough evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction and, if so, whether it's in the public interest to prosecute.

"Public interest factors in favour of prosecution include those cases where the defendant is in a position of authority or trust, both in the public and private sector. This includes police officers.

"Equally, public interest factors against prosecution are applied to cases involving police officers as they would to any other cases - for example, if an officer has committed an offence as a result of a genuine mistake."

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