IF they are in the mood, politicians will stop at nothing to prove a point.

Mid-Worcestershire Tory MP Peter Luff, for example, is not willing to rest until he has proved police numbers are falling under Labour.

In fact, he was so determined, he chased a Government Minister out of the Commons debating chamber and served her with a bundle of evidence behind the Speaker's chair!

After digging out statistics in the Commons library, he tried to get the issue debated on BBC radio.

But he was thwarted in his attempts to vent his anger on air when Labour declined to put up a spokesman to challenge his views forcing producers to pull the plug.

Mr Luff then moved on to his next port of call: the chamber of the House of Commons.

Spotting his chance during a debate about the private security industry, he put Home Office Minister Barbara Roche firmly on the spot.

He said: The very useful document Police Service Strength, produced by the library, shows that under each and every Conservative Government, police numbers in West Mercia rose, sometimes by..."

At this point he was interrupted by the threat of intervention from the Speaker but he was not going to be put off.

He continued:Police numbers in Worcestershire increased under every Conservative government and have fallen by 7 per cent under the present Government. That is the fact that I cannot get on to the public record because there is a conspiracy of silence...The Minister was not having any of this, and asked Mr Luff to give way.

She said his figures did not stack up, adding: If he looks at them, he will see that, during the Conservative years, police numbers were falling, and that it is only now, as a result of the resources that we have put in, that that picture is changing. That is the truth.

Mr Luff countered: I am drawn into considerable difficulties here. I am glad to provoke the Minister, but she is simply wrong, as far as my constituency is concerned, at least.

The exchange ended without a satisfactory conclusion for Mr Luff.

So it was at this point that he hot-footed it after the departing Minister.

He said: Shortly after my speech ended, Barbara Roche went to leave the chamber.

I had the figures with me and I was determined to show them to her, so I followed her out.

It took her a little while to focus upon them, but she was more than a little surprised.

She said she would have to show them to Charles Clarke, the Minister in charge of the police..."

This, it is fair to assume, will not be the end of the story.