Police are getting tied up in needless jobs despite soaring crimes statistics, claims a Police insider.

Yesterday Police revealed incidents of wounding and robbery had leapt over the third quarter of this year while theft from cars had also shot up by 70 percent, with Pembroke being particularly hard hit.

Housebreaking was up by 64 percent compared with the same time last year, again with Pembroke faring the worst.

However one Police insider blasted chiefs for wasting staff on non-jobs.

The source said: "There are too many stupid little jobs like helping run the Outward Bounds course and the outreach programme for children.

"There are about 25 policeman involved in all kinds of unnecessary things such as the computer section. What are they doing? You tell me?'' He said efforts at civilianisation of red-tape jobs had backfired, leading to empire building in areas such as the Human Resources department.

"There never used to be this department. Now there are several clerical staff and some of those are Police officers. There's lots of these little niches throughout the force, but we don't have people on immediate call.'' The source also said "overfussy laws and busybody callers'' meant officers were tied up with minor matters. The insider said: "Bermuda is a society of complainers. People ring up about barking dogs. There's too many man hours spent dealing with petty complaints. It screws up the response times.'' He also cited the break-up of Police into separate divisions covering the East, West and Central regions for leading to a duplication of posts.

This theme was echoed by PLP MP and former Assistant Police Commissioner Wayne Perinchief, who said Bermuda was too small to need parochial units.

He said: "It's a national Police force, but we have them split up into three sections all needing separate commands.

"They've run down the traffic section and so we've lost the ability to rapidly deploy people from central command in emergencies.'' Crime figures on the rise Mr. Perinchief blamed the hike in crime on drugs-related offences but said Police chiefs were targeting the drug barons while going soft on the drugs pushers who were plying their wares with relative impunity.

He also attacked empire building in the force - citing the Human Resources department as an area which was overstaffed.

He said: "It used to have a chief inspector - now there's four people doing that job.'' He also said civilianisation of administration roles was no panacea: "When officers did these jobs they could revert to Police roles to cover sickness, holidays and emergencies, but now they are civilians (and) they aren't able to help out in emergencies.

UBP Home Affairs spokesman Michael Dunkley blamed declining Police numbers for the rise in crime. Police numbers have dwindled in the last ten months -- from 444 to around 400 -- although some have claimed the figure is as low as 330.

A Police spokeswoman said high profile patrols backed by reservists and the expansion of CCTV into the North Hamilton area would help reverse the crime hike.