Bermuda's Police Service will have more officers on the beat following yesterday's Budget statement.

The force will be able to civilianise 15 posts -- freeing trained officers to get back on duty.

More than $33 million will be spent on the force, the majority of which will be swallowed up by general and mobile duty expenditure.

But $2 million will be spent in the war against drugs and another $1.25 million will go on criminal investigations.

Public Safety Minister Quinton Edness said that the Budget enabled the Police Service to become strengthened, highlighting the Government's commitment to tackling crime.

"What we are doing is strengthening the force,'' Mr. Edness said.

"We realised about two years ago that there were a number of trained Police officers doing desk jobs. We saw that it was obvious that, if we wanted to strengthen the force we had to civilianise those posts and get the Policemen back on the streets.'' An extra $116,000 has also been set aside to cover the operational costs of soon-to-be-installed closed circuit television cameras.

The camera's, which will cost more that $1 million to install, should be up and running by the end of the year.

"That doesn't mean to say that the system has gone over budget,'' Mr. Edness said.

"But, once it is installed we will need to employ people to monitor the cameras. That's what this money is for.'' Another important development is the setting up of a halfway house -- a facility where prisoners can be rehabilitated before finally completing a jail sentence.

"This is something that we have wanted to set up for some time,'' Mr. Edness said.

"We have now found a property to develop and hopefully it will be up and running by the end of the financial year.'' An estimated $450,000 will be spent on the project.