DIANE Abbott has smashed the election cringe-o-meter by displaying remarkable levels of incompetence over Labour's pledge to fund 10,000 extra coppers - but it gets worse.

After her LBC interview, Labour's shadow home secretary went onto BBC Hereford & Worcester where she claimed two police forces around here - "West Mercia Police" and the (non-existent) "Herefordshire Police" - have suffered major cuts.

Ignoring the fact Herefordshire Police does not exist, she then claimed both forces have lost a combined 450-plus officers since 2010, over-inflating the true figure by at least 35%.

And you thought Donald Trump got confused!

* LAST week we told you how Labour’s Dan Walton, standing in Bedwardine at the county council elections, claimed Tory Councillor Alan Amos “ran off” when the two came across each other whilst knocking doors, but is his verdict of events pure bunkum?

Cllr Amos insists he didn’t run anywhere and says he has witnesses to back him up - telling The Source he merely walked off to carry on door-knocking, rather than indulge in “completely insincere hypocritical banter”.

Let’s have the truth!

* A BIZARRE internet story was doing the rounds last week suggesting Jeremy Corbyn's beard will lose him votes, but not everyone likes 'em clean shaven.

Councillor Richard Udall was door-knocking in St Johns when a student asked him if Sinn Fein was standing election candidates in Worcestershire, going on to describe Gerry Adams as "hot".

"I was left completely speechless," he tells us.

* A HUGELY important count is taking place down the road today to elect the first ever West Midlands Mayor - with a distinct Worcestershire theme.

The Lib Dem's hopeful happens to be ex-Malvern county councillor Beverley Nielsen, a former Tory 'A Lister' who switched in 2009 after never being selected for a parliamentary seat.

* THE campaign to get anything like a decent train service out of Worcestershire lingers on, known as Fast Track Worcester, which aims to cut all journey times to the capital to 'under two hours'.

Yet the evidence suggests train bosses could enact this wish right now, if they wanted to.

Former long-serving county MP Sir Peter Luff was on a train doing that very trip the other day, which made the journey in 1hr 58 minutes. Choo-choo.