CLAIMS that Dorset Police is falling behind the performance of other forces in using submitted traffic camera footage has been denied.

Cllr Peter Sidaway (Broadstone) said that in the West Midlands over 90 per cent of footage given to the police was acted on – while in Dorset it was less than 50 per cent.

Councillors were told that in the future Artificial Intelligence may be used to screen submitted dashcam footage, speeding up the process.

He claimed that in some cases in Dorset warning letters, the lowest level of response, were no longer being sent out.

Dorset Police and Crime Commissioner David Sidwick says that having a bigger budget would result in more footage being actioned: “If I had a magic wand and lots of money we would be able to hit 90 per cent,” he said.

His Chief executive Simon Bullock said he suspected that the West Midlands 90 per cent figure could be accounted for by letters being sent thanking people for their submission – resulting in a recording that the footage was ‘actioned.

He said that Dorset’s Operation Snap, as it is known, did sometimes present difficulties in interpreting footage accurately enough to bring forward a prosecution because of a lack of road markings or other fixed point from which measurements could be taken.

“It’s actually quite difficult and challenging to get some of those through…  but we are still trying to push more and more uses of Op’ Snap and get people to submit that information – the number of submissions is increasing; the number of warning letters is increasing; the number of cautions is increasing and the number of ‘words of advice’ is increasing,” said Mr Bullock.

He said there was the limited opportunity to build in more capacity to analyse submitted footage, which is restricted by available budget, although Artificial Intelligence may be used in the future to help with the initial screening of thousands of hours of footage.

“It is improving – but we do have a distance to go,” said the Chief Executive.