SOUTH Yorkshire Police, reeling from both Hillsborough and the Rotherham child sex abuse scandal, desperately needs a strong leader.

Dave Jones may be just that man. But he will be a sad loss to North Yorkshire.

He came here as chief constable in 2012, at the time when the North Yorkshire force was itself reeling from the departure of chief constable Grahame Maxwell and his deputy Adam Briggs. Mr Maxwell had admitted gross misconduct over the appointment of a relative to the force. Mr Briggs, meanwhile, had faced unrelated investigations into a £10,000 training programme and claims that he, too, had helped relatives in a recruitment process.

Mr Jones brought much-needed stability - and since he came has been the driving force behind the restructuring of the force to meet the needs of the 21st century.

He put expensive Newby Wiske Hall up for sale; held a series of online web-chats so members of the public could question him directly; and introduced new technology such as handheld computers for frontline police officers designed to enable them to spend more time on patrol rather than in an office filling in forms.

Under his leadership, North Yorkshire has been consistently rated one of the safest places to live anywhere in the country.

In January, his contract as North Yorkshire's chief constable was extended for three years. "He has done a good job and we need to hang on to him," said police and crime commissioner Julia Mulligan.

South Yorkshire's gain is very much our loss, therefore. But at least we have a proven safe pair of hands in Deputy Chief Constable Tim Madgwick, who will stand in for Mr Jones while he is in South Yorkshire.

We wish Mr Jones well in his new, temporary role. But we also hope he'll be able to return sooner rather than later.