MANY of the planned spot checks on taxis in Bolton were cancelled last year because police pulled out at the last minute to deal with other emergencies.

A Bolton Council report said some of the planned operations — carried out to assess the safety of private hire vehicles and taxis — had to be cancelled.

Police were called away to other emergency work and did not have adequate resources to assist the council and the Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (VOSA) with checks.

The council does not pay the police for this help — but has said it will consider doing so in future. Manchester City Council has already taken this step.

The report to the licensing and environmental regulation committee said Manchester guarantees the time of traffic officers by paying for the service.

Cllr Anthony Connell, chairman of the committee, did not blame the police, saying they have had to endure "big cuts".

Police say the Bolton division is "proactive" in competing for finite force-wide resources used for these checks.

The report reads: "Unfortunately due to lack of GMP resources many of the planned operations have had to be cancelled, sometimes at the last minute, due to lack of GMP support as they are called away to other emergency work.

"An operation planned for March 29 and 30 last year had to be cancelled as GMP could not support it.

"Some local authorities, such as Manchester, pay traffic police to assist with planned checks which means they will not then be asked to assist with other work at the last minute."

The checks, carried out throughout the year, have three possible outcomes green, amber or red.

A green is a pass, and amber means the vehicle requires repairs but they are not so serious that the driver is suspended.

If the result is red, the driver is suspended because the vehicle has a defect so serious the public may have been at risk.

A council spokesman said: “We would consider paying the police for carrying out spot checks in future.

"However, we would need to consider all options and look at what other authorities do, prior to making a decision.”

Cllr Connell said: "It is something we will have to look at and assess the costs.

"We do expect the service but the police have had to make cuts and that must be having an impact.

"It is similar to the police providing officers at football, and the clubs have to pay for that."

The council will assess the arrangements at the other authorities in Greater Manchester before making a decision.

Chf Insp Carol Martin, from Bolton police, said: "Locally we have excellent provision for working in partnership and joint operational activity.

"We are fortunate in that we have more resources than other local agencies and so it is often us initiating activity.

"From a force perspective we only have finite specialist force resources which have to service all the divisions.

"These are tasked out accordingly and Bolton division is very pro-active in getting force resources."