Northern Ireland spends £2m to repair police vehicles

Attacks on police vehicles in Northern Ireland have cost almost £2 million to repair in the past five years.

There have been almost 4,500 reports of damage to police cars and Land Rovers since 2005, according to the Department of Justice.

The figures outlining the £1.9 million repair bill were disclosed to SDLP MLA member Thomas Burns in response to an Assembly question.

The South Antrim representative said the number of attacks is on the decline – 1,477 at a cost of £705,000 in 2005 compared with 507 last year costing £264,000 – but he said vandalism is still diverting much needed money from the police budget.

“The significant reduction in the number of malicious attacks on police vehicles since 2005 is very welcome and signals a move toward the normalisation of the police service, although we still have a long way to go,” he said.

“Nevertheless, these types of attacks are still a huge drain on police resources taking money out of our policing budget.

“These figures also underline the risk which police put themselves under in the course of their duty serving the public.”

The total bill does not include more than 2,000 damage repairs, many of them understood to be minor, that were not costed over the five-year period.

Source: Press Association