THAMES Valley Police’s new Chief Constable has laid out his aims for the next year.

Francis Habgood was speaking to the performance scrutiny committee at Oxfordshire County Council last Thursday.

He said making sure more victims get justice, improving the visibility of the force and working with health services on mental health issues were the force’s top priorities.

Mr Habgood said he also wanted to increase the percentage of rape and violent crime files submitted to the Crown Prosecution Service that are assessed as trial ready.

As reported in the Oxford Mail, only 12.5 per cent of rapes in Oxford last year ended with a suspect being charged or cautioned.

As well as improving conviction rates, Mr Habgood said he wanted to improve police presence in communities through social media and uniformed patrols.

In his plan for 2015/16, he said: “To achieve this we will tailor patrol strategies according to analysis of where crime occurs and where uniformed presence will have greatest impact.

“We will continue to maximise the contribution of special constables to policing in the Thames Valley.”

In Oxfordshire, there are 571 special constables which have put in nearly 9,500 hours since January.

Mr Habgood told the committee he wanted the force to continue working with the NHS on mental health problems.

He said steps had already been made through a pilot scheme in Oxfordshire linking mental health workers with police for better earlier diagnosis. It meant that in January, paramedics took 62 per cent of mental health patients to hospitals, compared to 27 per cent in 2014.

The number of patients going to police custody was 9.5 per cent last year, compared to 30.6 per cent in 2013.