NORTH Yorkshire Police are among the worst in the country at answering 999 calls, new figures have revealed.

It is the latest evidence of the long-running problems at the force’s control room that leave callers hanging on for too long whether they ring 999 or the non-emergency 101 number.

The force says it needs more control room staff and its current staff work "incredibly hard in a very challenging environment".

The national aim is for police to answer 999 calls within 10 seconds.

Figures released through the Home Office, show that North Yorkshire police control staff took on average 30 seconds to answer 999 calls between November and April, the third worst performance in the country.

Only West Midlands Police at 31.4 seconds and Northumbria Police at 31 seconds were worse.

Half of all 999 callers to North Yorkshire Police waited at least 16 seconds, the worst performance by a force in the country.

Only 42.8 per cent were answered at North Yorkshire Police control within 10 seconds compared with the 91.3 per cent answered in 10 seconds by Avon and Somerset Police.

North Yorkshire assistant chief constable Lindsey Butterfield, said:"This falls below the standard that our communities deserve, and we are working hard to immediately increase that rate so people in need of our help get through to us quickly.

“Whilst there are a number of factors which impact on the speed at which 999 calls are answered, we recognise that we are not staffed to meet our current elevated levels of demand and we are investing in a number of measures to make improvements and get calls answered quicker.

“This includes putting in place enhanced recruitment plans for more staff within our Force Control Room. We expect to have recruited 10% above our establishment by September 2022. The additional 10% allows for the levels of staff turnover that we experience.

“We have also established a pool of reserve staff to deal with administrative tasks on behalf of the call takers in the Force Control Room. The additional costs for these interim arrangements have been funded by North Yorkshire’s Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner.

“The dedicated team of staff who handle our calls within our Force Control Room work incredibly hard, in a very challenging environment. We will be recruiting for our next intake very shortly so if you or someone you know is interested in joining the team, please keep an eye on the jobs section of our website or register your interest via our vacancies page.”

In February, a meeting of the North Yorkshire Police, Fire and Crime Panel heard that between July and December last year an average of seven per cent of callers to the non-emergency 101 line between July and December last year waited more than 15 minutes and in July some 33 per cent of calls to the number were abandoned.