New police recruits in Oxfordshire will be trained at "home" in a new move to boost recruitment, particularly among ethnic minorities.

Instead of spending months away in one of the national training centres, locally recruited rookies will do their training at Abingdon and Witney College's Abingdon campus.

And once qualified they will work in Oxfordshire.

One of the main aims is to help officers with family commitments stay closer to home, instead of spending 12 weeks on a residential course at the Ryton on Dunsmore police training centre near Coventry.

Thames Valley Police Acting Chief Constable Sara Thornton said: "The new training is non-residential and people with families will be able to consider it as well as people from a wide range of backgrounds. This is another way we can make ourselves accessible to all sections of the community."

Under the new training scheme, known as Initial Police Learning Development Programme, the probationers will spend a two-week attachment doing voluntary work in a drug treatment unit.

They will also work in a prison or in the community getting to know different groups.

New recruit Jasbir Jazz' McLearie, 37, from Westbrook Green in Blewbury, is married with two young children.

She said: "It is ideal for me to be training near home. I can get the kids off to school in the morning and pick them up later.

"If I had to stay away for a week in Coventry I might not have joined the police."