Local police officers and the staff that support them do a fantastic job keeping us safe.

That they do so with less money available for the community policing we all value makes them even more worthy of praise.

But there are understandable concerns about the pressures on local policing.

There’s a feeling amongst residents that the police just don’t have the resources they need to deal with routine crime like break-ins and anti-social behaviour, let alone traffic infringement which comes top of my inbox.

How local people perceive our police is just as important, and the Government needs to recognise the intense resource pressures that our officers are under.

But just because our local police do a great job with limited funds, it doesn’t mean that they should have to.

In the time since I was elected I have been arguing that, after years of pay restraint and budget cuts, the time has come to make sure our police have the resources they need.

So I was pleased to see that last week the new Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, told the Police Federation that he would prioritise police funding during the next spending review in 2019.

I’ll be making sure that the Government keep this promise: if you ask the Conservatives about police budgets they will tell you that more funding is available this year for police forces. What they don’t tell you is that this comes after years of cuts and is only because they have allowed Police Commissioners to increase their share of the council tax.

If the Home Secretary is serious about increasing police funding this cannot just be done by hiking up the Police Commissioners’ part of the council tax year after year.

Secondly, our police need more resources now: a spending review won’t start until 2019, will presumably takes months to report and then government ministers will take months more before making a decision. I don’t think our police forces should have to wait – they need more support now.

Thirdly, I think that Police and Crime Commissioners are a failed experiment and should be axed. Elections are costly, with very low turnouts, and there are some questionable decisions on the use of public money. The Conservative Police Commissioner for our area, who earns £85k a year and already has chief and deputy chief executives paid £186k between them, has recently hired a deputy – former Vale District Council leader Matthew Barber – on a £65k a year salary. Is this really necessary?

We must make sure the police have the funding they need to boost community confidence by being embedded in town and village life and focusing on the flow of community intelligence.