WILTSHIRE’S Police and Crime Commissioner has said he believes the lack of custody facilities in Salisbury is having “no effect” on policing in the city.

In an interview with the Journal, Angus Macpherson said the “robust” system of prisoner transport, which sees detainees taken to Melksham, was enabling policing to continue in the city and the facilities at Bourne Hill were “much more convenient for people to go and see police”.

He said: “There’s been no diminution of arrests in Salisbury – the actual arrests for criminality at the time it’s happening has shown no change.”

He defended the recent U-turn by the county’s chief constable Patrick Geenty, saying: “I think it shows the chief constable’s passion for local policing - his expression was one of honest intention.”

In April Mr Geenty said that despite the proposed custody suite “not making sense” in business terms, the city needed one and he would resign if it did not get one.

But earlier this month he announced all plans for the new unit on the old engine site near Salisbury Railway Station were on hold, instigated a three-month review of custody provision in the county and warned the city may never have its own again.

Mr Macpherson said the review would look at the number of soldiers and families returning to south Wiltshire as part of the army rebasing.

He said: “We need to build a custody suite that’s going to serve the people of Salisbury and south Wiltshire for the next 25 years – we didn’t have a clear view of the changing demographic before and we need to understand exactly what that looks like.

“A lot of things have changed which can be addressed in the relatively short period of the three-month review – no one is going to thank me for spending £7 million on something that’s going to end up a white elephant.”

The police station in Wilton Road, which had 13 cells, closed in June to make way for a new University Technical College in the city. Detectives, neighbourhood police and front counter, dealing with the public moved to Bourne Hill with emergency response cars working from Amesbury and the use of Melksham’s custody facilities being a temporary measure.

In responding to the move by Salisbury’s resident judge Keith Cutler, Salisbury’s MP John Glen and local solicitor Richard Griffiths to speak out against the U-turn over cells in the city, Mr Macpherson said: “I’m disappointed they felt that – I would hope they would understand that if you are spending a large amount of money, you need to get it right.”

He added: “Salisbury and the south of the county has a massive opportunity for employment of young people going through the UTC and good employment and education is a good way of reducing crime.”