Victims of crime could also report them by video call, the Chancellor added (Piccture: Getty/Metro.co.uk)
Drones could be sent out to 999 calls instead of police officers to speed up response times, Jeremy Hunt said as he announced investment aimed at making public services ‘more efficient’.
Victims of crime could also report them by video call, the Chancellor added as he unveiled a £230million package to roll out new ‘time and money saving technology’ in his Budget statement.
Follow Metro.co.uk’s blog for live updates on the spring budget
Mr Hunt told MPs: ‘Police officers waste around eight hours a week on unnecessary admin – with higher productivity, we could free up time equivalent to 20,000 officers over a year.
‘So we will spend £230 million rolling out time and money saving technology which speeds up police response time by allowing people to report crimes by video call and where appropriate use drones as first responders.’
The Chancellor said violence reduction units and hot spot policing ‘have prevented an approximate 136,000 knife crimes and other violent offences as well as over 3,000 hospital admissions’.
He told the Commons ‘every crime costs money’ so £75million will be earmarked ‘to roll that model out in England and Wales’.
The Chancellor said violence reduction units and hot spot policing ‘have prevented an approximate 136,000 knife crimes and other violent offences (Picture: UK Parliament)
Mr Hunt also said £170 million would be used to fund ‘non-court resolution, reduce reoffending and digitise the court process’.
He also said £165 million would be invested over the next four years to increase the capacity of the children’s homes estate.
An additional £105 million over the next four years would be used to build 15 new special free schools, Mr Hunt added.
The Chancellor, delivering a statement aimed at reviving both an ailing economy and reversing the Conservatives’ opinion poll deficit, said he was offering ‘permanent tax cuts’ in a ‘Budget for long-term growth’.
He also aimed to deliver ‘more efficient, better value and higher quality public services’.
Mr Hunt made a 2p cut in national insurance for workers and the self-employed the centrepiece of a tax-cutting Budget with an eye on this year’s general election.
He said the cut, which will come in from April, will result in the lowest effective personal tax rate since 1975 and could result in getting the equivalent of 200,000 more people in work.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
For more stories like this, check our news page.
MORE : This is how the Spring Budget will affect our energy bills
MORE : Chancellor announces how free childcare extension will work in Budget
MORE : Fuel duty frozen for another year in the Spring Budget 2024