The Conservatives have claimed police authorities are facing budget shortfalls of millions of pounds.

The party published research on Thursday which it said highlighted funding problems affecting forces across England and Wales.

Shadow home secretary David Davis said the government was turning a blind eye to the difficulties it had imposed through bureaucratic burdens.

While ministers insist that all forces are getting real terms cash increases in the next year, Davis said his survey showed this was not the case on the ground.

London's Metropolitan Police expects to have to save £60 million to balance its budget, he claimed, while the Kent authority is facing a £19 million deficit and Norfolk £7.8 million.

Overall police authority precepts paid for through the council tax will have increased by 131.2 per cent by next year compared to when Labour came to power in 1997, the Tories estimated.

Davis said the picture was at odds with government promises to put more officers on the beat.

"Police authorities increasingly find their hands tied behind their backs by Labour's centralising approach to policing," he said.

"Police forces have every right to feel aggrieved at the lack of local control as they are held to ransom by a government that tells them how to spend their money and forces them to spend time on form filling and gimmicks and not on meeting local priorities and needs.

"Reports of funding problems and cutbacks in police forces across the country come as a double whammy for the public who have already paid for their police through the council tax.

"These cuts can only mean one thing – a poorer standard of policing. Conservatives will fund an extra 40,000 police officers to tackle crime. It is this type of commitment which is needed from the government. Sadly they have refused to match it."

Davis added that the government's promise to be tough on crime "seems increasingly hollow".