THE Government is today facing mounting pressure to ditch its "shambolic" police funding review after it emerged a Home Office blunder had left forces in North-East and North Yorkshire facing at least £29 million of extra cuts.

Police and crime commissioners across the region said Whitehall officials needed to go back to the drawing board, amid fears skewed figures could lead to a mass cull of officers.

They said their ability to plan for safety of their communities had also been compromised by Home Office mandarins applying the wrong data in its planned overhaul of how cash grants are distributed to forces.

The Home Office admitted the use of out of date figures had led to the error, ahead of cuts being announced in the Spending Review on November 25, which are expected to be between 25 and 40 per cent.

The mathematical mistake has left the Durham force facing having £10 million less to spend each year, North Yorkshire £5.1 million and Northumbria £14 million.

Commissioners said it remained unclear how the proposed funding cuts would affect officer numbers.

North Durham MP Kevan Jones has claimed the Durham force faced losing the equivalent to 200 officers, but senior police sources said the number of staff that could be retained would be impossible to calculate until December.

Cleveland commissioner Barry Coppinger said he would today calculate how his force would be affected by the error, but added deep cuts in neighbouring forces would have a negative impact across the region.

He said: "This whole formula review process has been a disaster from start to finish and I share my colleagues concerns about whether we should go back to the drawing board."

Highlighting the flawed process, Mr Coppinger revealed he had been forced to submit a Freedom of Information Act request in an attempt to get details from the Government about how the formula was to be calculated, only to receive a response after a crucial deadline.

North Yorkshire's commissioner, Julia Mulligan, and six counterparts had already threatened legal action over the funding changes process before it was found 31 of 43 forces in England and Wales, particularly ones with large rural populations, would be worse off the than the funding formula proposed last month.

While Durham commissioner Ron Hogg said he was baffled as to how to his area could be policed with a 12.5 per cent smaller budget, his Northumbria counterpart, Vera Baird, said the error had left her force facing a disastrous impact with just 12 working days until the Spending Review.

Both commissioners have appealed to the Government to abandon its proposals, while Conservative Mrs Mulligan said the Home Office's admission signalled that the process was "a shambles" and that she would join a coalition of forces in considering an appeal.

She said: "It does cause a huge amount of problems late in the day."

Darlington’s Tory leader Heather Scott added: “The whole allocation needs looking at again as it could have a catastrophic effect on the people of Durham and Darlington."

Former North Yorkshire Police deputy chief constable Peter Walker said the opaque funding formula needed revising and while the emerging proposals were presenting "enormous difficulties" for forces, it would be sensible for commissioners to wait until final figures were produced.

Policing minister Mike Penning pledged the formula would be refined in ongoing talks with commissioners.

He said: “Allocations for individual police force areas have not been set and decisions on funding will not be made until after the spending review reports in November.”