NORTH Yorkshire's chief constable has indicated just how low a priority policing the new ban on hunting with dogs will be for her force when it becomes law next spring.

Asked this week by a member of the public at a police authority meeting whether the force would be active in enforcing the ban on hunting, Della Cannings said: "If people break the law in front of us we have a duty to act, but I would be interested to hear from the public how high it is in their list of priorities to tackle hunting with our finite resources."

Several members of the public at Tuesday's meeting in Richmond said it would be at the bottom of their list of priorities.

"Feedback from this and other meetings seems to suggest that most people are more concerned about us tackling quality of life issues than hunting," said Ms Cannings.

"But there is the potential for public disorder so we have been working with the different agencies to encourage them to let us know their plans and what is going on, so that we are in a position to best respond to it."

The police authority meeting heard how the force was topping the league of similar sized forces in the number of crimes being detected.

Compared with forces of a similar population and geographical area, North Yorkshire police is top in detecting sexual offences, robberies and violent crimes.

The authority heard how crime levels had fallen in every area other than violent crime.

Statistics for the year ending in October showed total crime was down by 14pc across the force area.

Burglary had fallen by 34pc, vehicle crime was down by 35pc, robbery was down 16pc and other crime had dropped 12pc. But violent crime, which includes domestic incidents, was up by 27pc.

Authority chairman Coun Michael Heseltine said other achievements included a 10.1pc reduction in deaths or serious injury and a 34.5pc drop in motorcycle collisions resulting death or serious injury. He said there had been a 13.2pc increase in the number of drink-driving arrests and a 4.7pc increase in the number of disqualified driver arrests.

A member of the public asked how the police had reduced the number of accidents.

Ms Cannings said: "Our policy is made up of three things - engineering, education and enforcement. Engineering safe roads is a big issue for the county council and we are very interested in that aspect.

"Our officers are active in education about road dangers and we target youngsters, motorists, teenagers and other groups to get the message across.

"We see enforcement as a last resort, but we work to make sure that when people deserve to be arrested, charged or fined, then they are."

Mick Welch, a resident of Tunstall, near Catterick, asked what could be done to tackle problems with speeding in the village and oversized vehicles using its roads.

Insp Barry Smith assured him that there were police officers specifically tasked to deal with problems in Tunstall. "We have contacted HGV operators, issued fixed penalty notices and talked to motorists to educate them about the problems in the village."