Road policing team gets ‘biggest reinvestment’ to tackle road deaths and organised crime

West Midlands Police has announced big changes to its roads policing unit with more patrols and new kit to tackle dangerous drivers and organised criminals

A policing team which patrols the roads in a bid to keep people safe and hunt down members of organised crime gangs has been given a boost. West Midlands Police ’s Road Policing Unit has been expanded with the promise of extra patrols, using new cars and the latest technology to make the region’s roads safer.

Road crime police targeting organised gangs using the road network have been boosted from two to three teams to boost their ability to ‘tackle serious and organised crime, burglars who steal vehicles from people’s driveways, county lines drug dealers and other major offending’.

West Midlands Police has revealed it will now use smaller high-performance unmarked cars to keep pace with the criminals – a force first. A second road harm team has been introduced, aimed to tackle the causes of collisions and reduce the number of people killed or seriously injured on the roads.

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They will be going after the worst drivers including uninsured motorists, as well as those who commit the fatal four offences behind most serious collisions – speeding, drink/drug driving, not wearing a seatbelt and using a mobile phone.

The police have also started using new branded ‘interceptor’ cars, operating 24/7 ‘on patrols and specialist operations’. Police said the aim is to ‘reassure law-abiding road users that we’re out there 24/7 and ready to respond quickly’.

Supt Gareth Mason, head of the Roads Policing Unit, said: “This is the biggest reinvestment in roads policing across the West Midlands for a generation. The teams have been given the mission to target criminals who use the road network, and reduce the number of vulnerable and other road users who are killed and seriously injured.

“We’re putting more officers out onto the roads, in new, unmarked, smaller and more agile cars that will allow us to be really nimble as we get around town and city centres. Our more advanced cars will have streaming cameras, allowing pursuits to be viewed in live by our control room.

“Behind the scenes, we’ll be making more use of Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras to allow us to respond more quickly and effectively when cars involved in crime are spotted on the region’s roads.”

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A West Midlands Police spokesperson said: “The major investment comes as our dashcam submission initiative, Operation Snap, goes from strength to strength. Last year, we invested in a dedicate team to review your footage of careless and dangerous driving, meaning the number of submissions has shot up from 207 in 2017 to 7,145 last year, and more than 10,000 already this year.”