Police drivers may have to undergo stricter tests before they get behind the wheel of a Police car.

And they will find themselves before the Courts if they are suspected of driving without due care and attention.

The stern warning came from Acting Assistant Commissioner Alan Bissell yesterday after yet another Police car crashed on Tuesday night, the fifth accident involving patrol vehicles on the Island in less than a month.

The vehicle was answering a 911 emergency call when the driver, a Police Sergeant, lost control, causing the vehicle to crash into a wall on South Road, Devonshire Parish.

The driver was uninjured in the smash and no other vehicle was involved.

Police are now investigating the cause of the accident.

Acting Assistant Commissioner Bissell said: "We will be looking at all aspects of training to what we can do to about this and ensure that it doesn't happen again.

"In each case the training of the individual driver will also be looked into.

"Hopefully this is just a run of bad luck. There doesn't appear to be one single explanation for the accidents.

"Of the accidents that have been investigated the drivers were clearly not at fault. But if they are at fault it's our policy to put them before the courts for driving without due care and attention.'' Mr. Bissell also said that public perceptions of Police driving was also a concern to both him and the Acting Commissioner.

"We should be setting an example to the public and if officers are not doing that then something needs to be done about it,'' he said.

"I would be very concerned if there was general criticism of Police drivers because they represent the Police.

"Officers trained up to Level Three still have to keep to the national speed limits. But these people are trained and there's no excuse for bad driving.

That doesn't mean that people don't make mistakes but if they do then action could be taken.'' Despite the spate of recent smashes the Acting Assistant Commissioner insisted that the Services's fleet of patrol cars was not depleted.

He admitted that the five cars now out of action represented a sizable proportion of cars owned by the force but that they had already been replaced.

And he said that there was no reason to suspect that the vehicles were below standard or should be replaced by different models.

"Our view at this early stage is that the equipment is not at fault and we don't keep the cars on the road for that long anyway,'' he said.