Britain04 September, 20263 min read
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood Gives Cleveland Police Extra £2m After A66 Crash Kills Seven
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Shabana Mahmood announced £2m extra funding for Cleveland Police to tackle serious crime. Announced in Parliament on 1 September 2026.
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A66 crash and funding
Cleveland Police Chief Constable Victoria Fuller said she was proud of her "brave" force but that it was being "let down" by the way it was funded after a fatal crash on the A66 killed seven people including two police officers. Fuller told the BBC that the force needed to become part of a larger force with greater resources, saying her officers were dealing with some of the highest crime levels in the country but with less than half the number of officers. The BBC reported that the Home Secretary announced Cleveland Police would be given an extra £2m to deal with the fallout from the crash, with 200 officers drafted in from elsewhere.
Police Professional said Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood announced the additional £2 million in Parliament on Monday, following the deaths of PC Matthew Blades and PC Tom Clough in a collision on the A66 alongside five young men travelling in a stolen car. The Northern Echo said Mahmood announced the funding on Tuesday, September 1, allocating an additional £2 million to Cleveland Police to tackle serious crime in the area after the crash in Middlesbrough.
PCC calls it insufficient
Cleveland's Police and Crime Commissioner Matt Storey welcomed the extra £2 million but told Rayo it was "a 'drop in the ocean'" and said it was "nowhere near enough" to address chronic underfunding. Storey said in the same Rayo interview that while Cleveland Police would use the additional £2m to deal with the immediate aftermath, "A one-off payment is not a solution." Teesside Live reported that politicians across the region said the money would not solve all the issues the force faces, with pleas made once again for a revised funding formula.
In the House of Commons, Teesside Live said Conservative MP Matt Vickers sought guarantees from the Home Secretary that a new funding formula will "properly reflect the pressures of serious and organised crime faced by Cleveland" so the £2m does not end up being "merely a sticking plaster." Teesside Live also quoted Labour MP Andy McDonald saying Cleveland had seen the "largest percentage reduction in full-time equivalent officers since 2010, losing around 13% of its officers."
What happens next
Multiple outlets tied the funding to the aftermath of the A66 crash and to Cleveland Police’s ongoing investigations into serious and organised crime, with the Northern Echo saying the force investigated claims the incident was linked to serious and organised crime in the region. The BBC said Fuller denied that gangs had control over parts of Middlesbrough, describing it as a "complex" area to police, and she pointed to high rates of school absence, drug addiction and mental health issues. The Northern Echo reported that Prime Minister Andy Burnham paid tribute to PC Matthew Blades and PC Tom Clough and said the House would wish to join him in expressing deepest condolences to their families, friends and colleagues.
Teesside Live said Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood told MPs that the "move to a new structure for policing in this country provides the best opportunity to relook at funding," while Matt Storey said police mergers discussed by Mahmood were not expected to happen until 2034. Sky News reported that a fundraiser for the families of PC Matthew Blades and PC Thomas Clough would see them share around £1.25m, with the Cleveland Police Federation saying its GoFundMe appeal totalled just over £1.2m as of 9am when donations were paused.