Revealed: Firearm police operations increase by 53 per cent across West Midlands

Figures released by the Home Office show armed police were called to 3,312 incidents in 2017/18.

This is up 53 per cent from the year before when there were 2,167.

Most of the operations took place in the West Midlands Police force area, where there were 2,421 in 2017/18.

In Staffordshire there were 330.

It comes as both forces increase the number of firearms officers.

West Midlands Police increased its number from 157 in 2015/16 to 241 in 2017/18 and Staffordshire Police 74 to 82.

West Midlands Police spokesman Lara Horsley said: “In the year to March 2017 we saw the number of firearms officers increase by more than half.

“We now have more armed patrol vehicles out and about on the streets of the West Midlands than ever before keeping people safe - and as a result we have the capacity to respond to more incidents.”

Across England and Wales, police carried out 18,746 armed operations in 2017/18.

Officers opened fire on 12 occasions, up from 10 the previous year.

This included the shooting dead of three terrorists to stop the London Bridge terrorist attack in June last year. Earlier this month a survey was published by the West Midlands Police Federation, showing 40 per cent of officers in the fore wished to be armed.

Currently, just 22 per cent of officers have access to Tasers.

Speaking yesterday, federation chairman Richard Cooke said: “These figures are a salutary reminder of the grave danger our officers face daily policing the streets and doing our best, with ever dwindling resources to keep the people safe.

“The increase in gun crime is frankly alarming.

“More specialist firearms officers are welcome, but they cannot be everywhere when the majority of unarmed colleagues and the public need potentially need them.

“All our frontline officers need Tasers now. New firearms officers are not new resources, they come at the expense of officer numbers in other areas such as response and neighbourhood policing which then have less.

“Clearly the threat has to be met, but it’s time the public knew that with 1970’s levels of police officers in the West Midlands, and a violent crime epidemic with over 30 killings already this year, there is only so much we can do.

“We need a government committed to law and order and an urgent investment in the police to prevent further catastrophe.”

London accounted for the largest proportion of police firearms operations with 5,142 (27 per cent). This was followed by West Midlands (18 per cent) and Yorkshire and the Humber with 2,130 (11 per cent).

Nationally, there were 6,459 officers by the end of March, an increase of 181 from the previous year.In the wake of of the terrorist attacks in Paris in November, 2015, the Government made an additional £143m available to increase the number of armed officers.

Simon Chesterman, the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for armed policing, said: “We’ve got enough volunteers coming forward at the moment, but when we speak to those officers, on perhaps why they don’t follow through on an application in the first place, quite often the main reason they give is that they’re concerned about what will happen to them in the event that they have to discharge a firearm.”