Cleveland Police and strategic business partner Steria are celebrating after scooping an award at the Association of Police Procurement Professionals conference, in the best cross functional project category for the fleet reduction programme.

The force has saved £158,077 a year, with savings of £439,000 over the next three years.

The savings were identified by the strategic fleet management group, led by chief superintendent Michael Hartnack.

It carried out a review of the fleet, questioning what was actually needed to maintain high levels of service to the public and to meet operational requirements and cut costs where possible.

A number of changes were made, including reducing the fleet as a whole from 309 to 279 vehicles, replacing vehicles less frequently, reducing the number of unmarked and non-specialist vehicles, use of personal mileage allowance and long-term hire vehicles where possible and a sponsored electric vehicle which doesn’t incur any costs.

Ann Hall, chief officer at Cleveland Police, said: “Our vision was to realise savings so that as much of our budget as possible is used to deliver front line policing in Cleveland. The team from Cleveland Police and Steria has worked incredibly hard, and I’m delighted that their excellent work has been recognised.”