NEW Home Secretary Jacqui Smith was in Trimdon yesterday to trumpet the rise in the number of police officers in Durham.

She inspected a mobile CCTV van and talked to residents in Trimdon Grange about their concerns over anti-social behaviour.

"It is Government money that means that there are more than 230 police officers more in Durham than there were in 1997, and the Durham force is now actively recruiting officers," she said.

She was responding to a leaflet circulated by the Liberal Democrats that was headlined "Labour's disappearing police". It said "Ten police lost this year, 100 next year?"

In November, Durham put a freeze on recruitment as it grappled with a shortfall of £3m in its finances - a shortfall, it said, which would mean the loss of up to 300 officers over the next three years.

However, in March the Government allowed the Durham force to increase its council tax bill by 34 per cent, or £35-a-year for a Band D property, to help make up the shortfall.

Now 54 new officers are to be recruited by next March - although the Lib Dems maintain that officer numbers have dropped by ten in the mean- time.

Ms Smith, supporting Labour's candidate Phil Wilson, said: "This is a shared responsibility between local and national government, and I would expect a strong local MP, as Phil will be, to lobby me for extra money.

"This has been a Government willing to invest in extra police officers and community support officers and willing to put in place the powers necessary to tackle crime and anti-social behaviour, powers opposed at almost every turn by the Lib Dems."

Last night, the Lib Dems' shadow home affairs spokesman, Nick Clegg, visited Newton Aycliffe to support candidate Greg Stone.

"Whatever statistics you care to quote, there is now a consensus across Westminster that police numbers and pressure on police finances will increase over time, and that this cannot be covered by increasing the police precept," said Mr Clegg, who was unable to meet any officers in Aycliffe because there were none available.

"There is a legitimate issue on police funding and there have been cuts in the recent past so it is reasonable for us to say that we are worried about the future. The reaction of Jacqui Smith and Labour shows how rattled they feel about this.

"Instead of chucking up the police precept, they should cancel ID cards and divert those resources into the frontline."

Ms Smith said that the Lib Dems' campaign was a "smokescreen" to hide that they were soft on crime and had opposed, among other things, the creat- ion of a DNA database.

Mr Clegg said: "We support the database but we don't support having thousands of young children and other innocent people on there."

He said that a person's DNA should not be retained on the database once they had been cleared of involvement in a crime.

"The Government is deliberately demolishing the fundamental difference between innocence and guilt," he said.