THE number of arrests in Salisbury has “dropped significantly” since the closure of the city’s police station, the county's Police Federation chairman claims.

Salisbury Police Station in Wilton Road closed in June to make way for the South Wiltshire University Technical College, and since then anyone who is arrested in the city has been taken on the hour-long trip to Melksham.

Wiltshire Police Federation chairman Mike White said: “My information is that arrests have gone down substantially. I feel this is something that needs to be brought to the public’s attention.

“We are also aware that police officers are being paid overtime to drive prisoners to Melksham instead of the prisoner transport team.

“With money being spent on police officers driving back and forth between Salisbury and Melksham, and there being less time for officers to do police work, it’s a false economy.”

Chief constable Patrick Geenty denied that there were fewer arrests, telling BBC Wiltshire that numbers had “remained stable” since the Wilton Road station temporarily closed in June.

And a Wiltshire Police spokesman said police officers were only asked to drive offenders to Melksham when there were “gaps in the duty roster” of detention officers, the police staff who maintain Prisoner Transport cover, and that they used overtime to do so.

While Wiltshire Police insisted the usage of Melksham’s custody facilities was just a temporary measure until a custody suite was built in Salisbury, they now say the city is unlikely to ever have its own cells again.

Mr Geenty launched a county-wide custody review earlier this week, saying that “financial challenges” had prompted the force to reconsider the city’s planned custody unit.

Announcing that the force was now looking at having two custody units instead of three in the county, he said: “Given that there will always be one in Swindon, we will be looking at where best to locate the second one.”

Salisbury’s resident judge Keith Cutler told the Journal he was “very worried” about the lack of police and custody facilities in the city while MP John Glen said Mr Geenty had reneged on his promises.

Mr White said: “I don’t necessarily dispute the decision that’s been made over the custody review but this has been caused by the decision to close Salisbury Police Station. This was politically motivated to ensure Salisbury got a UTC and was to the long term detriment of policing to the city.”

He is now calling for more transparency from Wiltshire Police and less “positive spin”.

“Some officers have become politicians and want to put a positive spin on everything when it would be far better to say ‘our arrests have gone down and it can be explained in this way’,” he added.

“If you can’t trust a copper, we’ve got problems.”