Lancashire Constabulary state: “We will do all we can to investigate your crime. Only when we have exhausted all available lines of enquiry and there is nothing more we can do, will we close a case.”

And they operate on the basis of intelligent policing.

I had occasion to contact the police in May 2009 when the rear of my car was hit by a young male driver who failed to stop after the collision.

I provided the police with the registration number of the vehicle and they traced the car to a neighbourhood garage who had hired the car out on a seven day trial.

This trace was very efficiently carried out.

However, they then accepted the statement of the garage proprietor that he failed to obtain the identity of the hirer and that the car was not returned but left in the street with the keys in the car.

Was this intelligent policing or was it unintelligent incompetence?

I leave this assessment to the reader.

Mike Madigan, Notre Dame Gardens, Blackburn.