POLICE chiefs and politicians have spoken of their initial relief after Chancellor George Osborne announced there will be no cuts to Lancashire Constabulary.

It had been feared the police budget could have been slashed by £62.5 million in yesterday’s comprehensive spending review.

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But Mr Osborne said it was vital to protect police budgets in view of the recent Paris terrorism attacks and announced there would be no cuts.

Mr Osborne told the House of Commons: “Now is not the time for police cuts. Now is the time to back our police and give them the tools to do their job. There will be no cuts in the police budget at all and there will be real term protection for police funding.”

Mr Osbourne said there would be a 30 per cent increase in the counter terrorism budget and there would be ‘more flexibility for police and crime commissioners to increase the local authority precept’.

Lancashire Police’s Chief Constable Steve Finnigan said the announcement would allow his force to continue to be proactive and not a ‘blue light only service’ and thanked all those who had campaigned against the cuts.

Last month Mr Finnigan and Lancashire police and crime commissioner Clive Grunshaw said they feared that the budget would be cut by up to 40 per cent.

They said if that had been the case then neighbourhood policing teams would have to be scrapped saving £34million, all public enquiry desks would be closed, dedicated road policing teams would be disbanded, support units - which deal with violent offenders and carry out drug raids – would go, along with the mounted and dog units.

They also said the force’s Major Investigation Unit would have to be reduced, meaning some rape and murder cases would have to be investigated by the region’s specialist crime unit Titan and the serious organised crime unit would also have been cut.

Despite the positives Mr Grunshaw, who launched a campaign challenging the proposed cuts, warned they would still have to fight the proposed changes to the police grant funding formula review which was postponed until next year after the Home Office admitted it got its figures wrong. That could still see the police lose £7 million.

There was also good news for others as the health, education, international aid and defence budgets were all protected, and Osborne surprised critics by doing a U-turn on tax credit cuts However the budget for transport will be reduced by 37 per cent, energy will lose 22 per cent, business will go down by 17 per cent and the environment has dropped 15 per cent.

Overall government spending will increase from £756 billion this year to £821 billion by 2020.

Hyndburn MP Graham Jones said: “The chancellor has given tax cuts to millionaires and is expecting council taxpayers in Lancashire to fork out for adult social care.”

Before the announcement, Pendle MP Andrew Stephenson was concerned about cuts possibly being made to education for 16 to 19 year olds and adult learning, as part of Whitehall savings, which would have affected Nelson and Colne College.