MORE than four times as many civilian staff have been employed by Hampshire police than uniformed officers in the past decade.

New figures from the Police Federation reveal the number of people employed by Hampshire Constabulary as non-uniformed staff nearly doubled from 1,443 in 2000 to 2,677 workers last year.

The number of officers brought into the force in that time rose by just 281 from 3,419 to 3,700 officers.

The Police Federation is warning that police chiefs across the UK are putting the public in danger by allowing the recruitment of civilians to outstrip officers.

But Hampshire Police Authority, which oversees the force, says it is happy with the figures, which keeps a “healthy balance” between civilian and uniformed staff.

Chairman Jacqui Rayment said the figures showed tasks that would have previously been done by police officers were being carried out by suitable members of staff.

Jobs such as manning the control room and tasks at a crime scene did not necessarily have to be carried out by police officers, she said.

Police Federation chairman Paul McKeever said: “At a time of financial restraint across the public sector, a rise in police staff numbers is absolute nonsense when the public want more officers on the beat.

“Instead we have increasing numbers of unidentifiable police staff who do not have the flexibility or resilience to give what is needed as an emergency service.”

Campaigners also backed the criticism over the figures in Hampshire.

Alan Kebbell, from Southampton, a former police officer, stood as a Ukip candidate at the recent General Election to campaign against the changes in the police force.

“The civilianisation of the force has happened far too quickly,” he said.

“It seems that it is just a cheaper way of getting things done.

“Only it is not working because things are not getting done, and many people are just not reporting crimes.”

Mark Wallace from the TaxPayers’ Alliance added: “The expanse of the police payroll has been extremely expensive but has done little to get crimefighting officers on our streets catching criminals.

“It’s a bizarre set of priorities which focuses on pouring money into staff who do not have the power to arrest anybody. Despite this expansion of office staff there has still not been a reduction for police officers in their amount of paperwork.”

Defending the figures, Mrs Rayment added that they included the 330 police community support officers and that they had constantly kept a balanced ratio of civilians to officers.