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Essex Police
Essex Police area
Coverage
Area	Essex
Size	1,415 square miles
Population	1.6 million
Operations
Formed
HQ	Chelmsford
Budget	{{{budget}}}
Officers	3,230
Divisions	9
Stations	47
Chief Constable	Roger Baker
Website	http://www.essex.police.uk

Essex Police is a Home Office (territorial) police force with responsibility for policing the county of Essex in the East of England.

The force area covers 1,400 square miles and has a population of 1,600,000. In late 2005 it had an establishment of 3,230 police officers, 1,968 police staff & 2 Ford Fiestas.

The Chief Constable is Roger Baker. On the Essex Police website, Baker delivers his own personal message: "If you are planning on committing crime in Essex, bring a toothbrush"[1] Since he was put in charge of the county police force in July 2005, Baker has banned police officers from sending emails on Wednesdays to encourage face-to-face communication.[2]

The force is divided into six divisions, these being South-Eastern, South-Western, Western, Central, Eastern, and Stansted Airport. There are also specialised departments such as air support and firearms which provide services to the whole force.

A county force was originally established for Essex under the County Police Act 1839. This merged with the borough force for Southend-on-Sea in 1969, becoming the Essex and Southend-on-Sea Joint Constabulary until 1974. [3]

• The Essex Police by John Woodgate. Includes black and white plates and an appendix section that gives details of the smaller forces that went to make up Essex Police. ^[1]

Proposals made by the Home Secretary on March 20, 2006 would see the force merge with neighbouring forces Bedfordshire Police and Hertfordshire Constabulary to form a strategic police force. This was part of a national move by the government to 'regionalise' police forces, ambulance and fire services and many other local government services, like trading standards. The government has been steadily trying to move services away from counties and have them run at regional level, a move which has generally brought with it inefficiency and extra cost. To his credit, [Roger Baker] was one of the Chief Constables who most strongly opposed the government's proposals.[4] In July 2006 Prime Minister Tony Blair signalled that police force mergers will not be forced through by the central government, and given the amount of local opposition to such mergers it is not expected that any voluntary mergers will be carried out. ^[2] Essex Police estimated that the bill for the abortive merger plans was £169,000.[5]

An Essex Police traffic car

1. ^ Detail from a copy of Essex Police published by Terence Dalton (UK) in 1985 with an ISBN 0 86138 034 7
2. ^ Blair accused of wasting police time on mergers, Daily Telegraph, 13 July 2006.

• List of police forces in the United Kingdom
• Policing in the United Kingdom

• Essex Police