LANCASHIRE Constabulary has welcomed the new Human Rights Act - dubbed by critics as a "criminal charter."

Local police officers have been encouraged to fully take on board the new legislation which enshrines individual human rights into UK law for the first time.

The laws have applied for many years but if anyone wanted to take action they had to go to the European Court of Human Rights but now cases can be heard in British courts.

And Assistant Chief Constable of Lancashire Constabulary, John Vine, fully endorsed the new act and said: "It gives the police service an anchor to policy making and direction to even better delivery and will help build public confidence in the police as well as other public authorities.."

He acknowledged that there may be some challenges to police powers and procedures but added: "Defendants may claim that their human rights were improperly violated and try to use this as a means of being acquitted from criminal charges. Or people may simply try to sue us for damages for breaching their human rights. This has already been interpreted by some as a criminal charter but this is unlikely to be the case. What is does mean is that the force has a positive obligation to ensure that respect for human rights is at the core of its day to day work by acting in a way that positively re-enforces the Act's principals.

According to the force's solicitor Niamh Noone, the Human Rights Act is nothing but good news.

"In our daily life our job is to uphold the human rights of not only the communities we serve but also of each other. This is what we do. This is our job. We are doing it already and we are doing it well. In our daily decision making the Act empowers us to consider whether human rights issues are involved and whether they can legitimately and proportionately interfered with."