88% of West Mercia opposed to police merger

West Mercia Police have been running a survey on their website to find out what people want to happen to West Mercia Police.

The British government wants to merge West Mercia Police with West Midlands Police to fit in with the unwanted, undemocratic, unelected regional assemblies make them better.

West Mercia Police is officially the best performing police force in the UK whilst West Midlands languishes in the bottom half of the table. West Midlands Police is a much larger, metropolitan police force and will control the combined force.

Owen Paterson, MP for North Shropshire, brought the subject up in Parliament today, informing the Home Secretary that 88% of people completing the survey were opposed to the merger of the force.

The Home Secretary said "You are right to draw attention to concern in West Mercia about the proposals for a merger, which has been expressed to me directly. I intend to wait for the conclusions reached by the police following the consultation before deciding how to proceed".

I'm wondering if Charles Clarke is perhaps misunderstanding the situation here. 88% of people in West Mercia are opposed to the merger. I don't see what there is to decide. The people of West Mercia have made their decision, the British government now know the level of opposition to the merger, the plan should immediately be scrapped.

I think I'll email him and explain ...