Question to the Home Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government how many traffic police by police region there were in England and Wales in (1) 2015, and (2) 2016.

The Home Office collects and publishes data annually on the primary function of police officers, as part of the ‘Police workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletins which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/police-workforce-england-and-wales (see attached table )These data include officers whose primary function is “Road Policing”. Officers with multiple responsibilities are recorded under their primary function.

Some forces are unable to make a clear distinction between certain functions and therefore record the majority of, or all, employees under one function. In particular, some forces have employees who work within units whose function is to provide both roads policing and armed policing. Reclassification of roles within a force can lead to fluctuations in the number of officers in a particular role between years.