CRIME-FIGHTING bosses have welcomed a new "coppers' contract" between the police and the public.

The minimum standards will set out the level of service people should expect when they contact the police for the first time.

Home Secretary David Blunkett said the contract, which will be in place in every force within two years, will ensure quick and convenient access.

But the charter has been dismissed as "management gibberish" by opposition leaders.

North Yorkshire Police chiefs said today they were committed to accessibility and high standards.

Superintendent Iain Spittal has been appointed as head of public access and is responsible for the performance of the force's two call centres.

A spokesman said today: "At North Yorkshire Police we have the most demanding target for answering both emergency and non-emergency calls in England and Wales.

"We also have rigorous standards for our response to these calls.

"We are pleased that the Home Office is thinking along the same lines and welcome the broad outline of their proposals.

"We firmly believe that the force should be accessible to the public and we feel that the public should also know exactly what to expect when they contact us."

North Yorkshire Police receives 850,000 non-urgent calls from the public every year and aims to answer them within 20 seconds.

It also aims to answer 999 calls, of which it handles 80,000 annually, within ten seconds of connection from BT. The response time for top priority "immediate response" calls is within 15 minutes in urban areas and 20 minutes in the countryside.

These include calls where someone's life is in danger, property is about to be damaged or a serious offence is in progress.

Mr Blunkett said improving customer service would be the central theme of a forthcoming police reform policy paper.

The "coppers' contract" will set national minimum standards to cover public contact, clearer information and how the police deal with initial calls

Forces will also be encouraged to measure feedback from the public about the service they have received.

He said: "These new rules will help ensure members of the public calling the police for non-emergencies will get a consistently high standard of service."

Updated: 08:27 Thursday, September 16, 2004