Essex Police's flagging ranks have been swelled by a £7 million advertising campaign, according to figures released by the Home Office today (Thursday).

The national campaign to boost police numbers has generated nearly 15,000 responses from interested applicants.

Out of those, 260 replies have been channelled to Essex - with similar numbers going to forces such as Cambridgeshire, Thames Valley and Sussex.

Essex Police are more than 100 officers under strength and a report to the county's police authority warns the force will need to recruit more than 200 officers a year for the foreseeable future.

Sue Adkins, recruitment manager for Essex Police, said: "We have been pleased with the response over the past year, having pursued a pro-active recruitment strategy.

"This has fitted in well with the Home Office campaign, in showing people what modern policing is all about."

She added: "We are confident of meeting our targets this year, but recruitment is an ongoing campaign, and we always welcome anyone interested in finding out more."

The national Could You? campaign, which is intended to span three years, prompted 57,000 responses in all - with 26,000 calls to a special call centre and about 31,000 hits on a website.

Of these, there were 14,883 'serious' expressions of interest in joining the police, which were passed on to local forces. These are now in the very earliest stages of the recruitment process.

Home Office Minister Mike O'Brien said: "Police strength figures released earlier this month show the fall in numbers is levelling out. For the first time in years the number of officers recruited into the service has exceeded those leaving it."

Falling sickness levels are also helping to improve police numbers, he said.

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