POLICE are urging callers to dial 999 in emergencies only, in a bid to make the East Lancashire call centre more efficient.

The central communications room at Blackburn Police Station, which deals with calls from Blackburn, Darwen, Hyndburn an Ribble Valley, receives more than 2,500 calls a day, 200 of which are 999s.

And of those 200, just 96 are deemed by police staff to actually be emergencies.

Since the communications rooms from across the area merged into one centre, police have been bombarded with complaints of calls not being answered quickly enough.

Now police have invited members of the public into the centre to explain how things work.

Communications room Sgt Stuart Bruce said: "999 calls immediately go to the top of the queue, shuffling down all the calls which have come in on normal numbers such as 382141 or 52111.

"It is very frustrating for us when people get to the top of the queue for something which isn't an emergency because other people who have had to wait longer and have called in on the proper number get annoyed at having to wait.

"That is why we would like to invite people in to our communications room to see what we are doing and how it works and why it is better than the old system.

"We feel that once people see what the new system is like, it will dispel a lot of myths.

"We do exist, we are here and we are doing our best but we need people to think whether they really need to dial 999."