Extra 90 police officers to be recruited in Hampshire

Hampshire’s police and crime commissioner Simon Hayes had previously announced 108 officers will be recruited.

He has today announced the extra officers following a cash boost from the 1.99 per cent council tax precept increase.

In a statement he said: ‘This illustrates the complicated, and detailed, financial planning we’ve needed to undertake to ensure we can afford, with the money available, to provide the highest numbers of officers to protect people and places across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight.

‘It has, and will remain, a priority for me to protect local neighbourhood policing teams – this is the heart of the British policing model, so valued and respected by the public.

‘In some parts of the country, neighbourhood policing has gone, but not here.

‘I am pleased to be able to confirm we will be recruiting an even higher number of officers, and be able to at least maintain our current policing levels into the foreseeable future, taking our latest recruitment figure to just under 200.

He added: ‘I would like to thank people living in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight for continuing to support policing locally, which was shown most recently by their overwhelming support to raise the council tax precept.

‘It has been this support, despite Government cuts nationally, that is allowing me to recruit these additional police officers at this time.’

He said there had been a large amount of applicants since the force advertised the jobs on Monday.

The recruitment will be the largest number of officers to enter the force since 2010.

The job application process is detailed here: hampshire.police.uk/internet/about-us/join-us