Calls to Merseyside police during England’s first game drop significantly compared to four years ago

Jun 23 2010 by Matt Hurst, Heswall News

THE number of calls to police dropped significantly on the day of England’s first World Cup match, compared to the same fixture in 2006.

Merseyside Police recorded a 37.5% reduction in both emergency and non-emergency calls on Saturday June 12, when placed against the number received during England’s first match at the last World Cup.

Between 7am on June 12 and 7am on June 13, a total of 2,477 calls were received, of which 1,082 related to emergencies and 1,395 were less urgent.

This compares to the 3,963 calls Merseyside Police received over the same period on the day England played their first match in Germany, four years ago.

Of those, 1,917 were emergency calls and 2,046 were non-emergency calls.

Superintendent Nick Phillips, of Merseyside Police’s Call and Crime Recording Bureau, said: “The calls we received on the day of England’s first World Cup match were typical of those we would receive on any other Saturday in June, and were actually very slightly lower than an average Saturday.

“Our call handlers answered 97.8 per cent of 999 calls within the target time of 10 seconds and 95.3 per cent of non-emergency calls within the target time of 30 seconds, which is an excellent result and well above the target level.

“We’ve been planning carefully to make sure that we have the right numbers of staff in place – we want to continue to answer calls from the public promptly and efficiently, and maintain these high standards.”

No football-related arrests were made on the day of England’s match with the USA.