Andrew George, MP for the West Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Constituency of St Ives, has today called on the Devon and Cornwall Constabulary to ensure that responsible citizens are not deterred from reporting useful information to the police by the price of calls to its non-emergency contact number.

Mr George had raised concerns that calls to the 0845 prefix number, which is promoted by the police as a local rate service, are generating profits for the force due to changes in the telecoms market since the prefix was first introduced which now make it more expensive than a normal local call. The number is also much more expensive to call using mobile or pay phones.

Mr George raised these concerns in a letter to Chief Constable Mr Stephen Otter who assured him that the force has "no intention of using the non-emergency number as a significant income generation device". Mr George, however, wants the Constabulary to speed up its plans to switch to a less expensive non-emergency number and to be clear with the public about what calls will cost.

"The police should not profit from responsible citizens who report helpful information using the non-emergency line," said the MP.

"Whilst I appreciate that the apparent profit is only a small fraction of the cost to the Constabulary of operating the service it is important that the police find a system which does not add costs to local people who have already paid for this service through their taxes.

"I hope the Constabulary can find a system which reduces the cost to local people and that, in the meantime, the local rate call' claims in their publicity are corrected."