PUBLIC safety will be put at risk if proposals to cut funding for roads policing units are given the go ahead.

Offences such as drink driving and crashes caused by careless or dangerous driving are expected to increase due to a lack of monitoring for the force and greater strain for existing officers.

Thames Valley Police funding has already been hit hard in the last decade, with savings of nearly £100m having to be made in the last seven years.

There were 1,792 deaths and more than 24,000 serious injuries on British roads in 2016, with roughly five fatalities every day due to collisions.

Andy Fiddler, a member of Thames Valley Police Federation, said: “The Federation’s message of ‘cuts have consequences’ is evident here, to cut roads policing will have a direct impact of an increased risk to the public. This can be seen for example in the offence of no insurance.”

“An uninsured driver is 10 times more likely to be a drink driver and six times more likely to be involved in a fatal collision.

“This is so relevant to the proposed cuts in TVP. The number of uninsured vehicles on the roads in TVP is on the increase, however vehicle seizures and detection of this is on the decline by as much as 30 per cent.

“A long time ago a link was made to offenders using the road network and disruption of their transport can prevent them offending, this made Roads Policing become more proactive on our roads. Sadly, the cuts in TVP will hinder this proactive approach even further.

“If there are fewer officers, this inevitably means fewer detections and fewer seizures.

"The new operating model that TVP has adopted has put even greater strain on Roads Policing with officers supporting their Local Police Area colleagues and attending an increased number of non-Roads policing related incidents.”

TVP has seen a 58 per cent spike in drug driving offences, with drink and drug driving constantly increasing.

Nationally, the Motor Insurance Bureau states that around 150-250 people are killed on our roads per year by uninsured drivers.