The secretary of the Police Federation’s National Detective Forum Karen Stephens has warned a new direct entry scheme is not the answer to the crisis facing detective policing.

Her comments come in response to the Home Office's announcement that it is to launch a new national accelerated scheme, led by Police Now, which will deliver training within 12 weeks and introduce 1,000 detectives over the next five years.

Police leaders have welcomed news of Home Office funding which will be used develop an accelerated national detective training programme.

Police Now will deliver the training within 12 weeks, which means that forces will be able to boost the number of detectives nationally by up to 1,000 in the next five years.

Police Now, the award-winning police graduate recruitment programme, will develop the scheme alongside the Home Office, which is providing £2.8million to support Police Now in 2018/19 and will provide an additional £350,000 seed funding for the detective entry programme.

The programme will include digital training to ensure that recruits are equipped to deal with the changing nature of modern crime. It will also focus on problem solving, crime prevention and safeguarding so that detectives on the scheme meet the needs of forces and communities.