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A senior police officer this week warned that forensic investigation
of serious crimes might be hampered by a lack of cash, as a result of changes
in the organisation of the Home Office’s Forensic Science Service.

Last month the service became an executive agency within the Home Office.
The police will now have to ‘pay as they go’ for forensic investigations
instead of a fixed annual rate.

Speaking in London this week, Eric Evans, who is deputy chief constable
of North Wales, said the change ‘is likely to become a nightmare’. He said
there was ‘a real possibility . . . of having a serious murder at the wrong
end of the financial year’.

Janet Thompson, director of the Forensic Science Service, said the agency
would provide ‘a better service for our customers’.