POLICE and crime commissioner Bill Longmore has been urged to challenge the Government over force cuts - with fears serious changes are on the way.

The elected figurehead of West Mercia Police, who is into his last year as the region's PCC, has been told to "think long and hard" about his future budget plans.

As well as cutting direct funding to police forces by five per cent for 2015/16, there are fears the Government is considering another 20 per cent reduction by 2020.

The Association of Chief Police Officers has already warned that forces face "a tipping point" and urged a re-think.

Mr Longmore will be setting his final budget over the coming months, which will kick in from next April for 2016/17.

Labour Councillor Richard Udall said: "Bill Longmore needs to think long and hard about the impact the Tory plan for slashing of the police budget will have on the safety of our communities.

"The Government should come clean about the numbers of frontline police that we are going to lose over the next five years, and Mr Longmore needs to explain how he can protect front line services from these cuts.

"He can no longer pretend that savings can be made without cuts to services which will put the public at risk, he needs to tell us how many Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) will go and which police stations he intends to close, the public need to know."

Mr Longmore admits he is "concerned" about the future but insists only the next PCC can be responsible for the years ahead beyond 2016/17.

He said: "People have shared their concerns with me recently about the possible impact of further Government cuts to local policing.

"I think a lot of their concerns are legitimate, and I want people to know I am concerned as well.

"When I was elected as PCC I put a plan in place for my term of office which tried to balance the priorities people told me they wanted, things like rural crime, business crime, cyber crime and neighbourhood policing, against the realities of spending cuts.

"We have stuck pretty closely to that plan.

"However, it now feels like there is very little fat left to trim within policing in West Mercia.

"If the Government does announce more significant cuts to central funding then I think something somewhere would have to give."

More details will only emerge during Chancellor George Osborne's comprehensive spending review in November.