In my editorial in this morning's edition of The Northern Echo, I said Merseyside Police had serious questions to answer about their handling of Peter Chapman, the man who murdered Darlington teenager Ashleigh Hall.

It has become increasingly clear as the day has gone on how strongly readers feel about the police's actions leading up to this horrific crime.

Telephone calls, emails and tweets underline the outrage felt in the local community.

Like me, readers do not understand how it took Merseyside Police nine months to sound a nationwide alert when Chapman went missing from his home, even though he was supposed to be registered as a dangerous sex offender.

Like me, they do not understand why he was just allowed to surf the internet in search of vulnerable young victims.

Like me, they have serious doubts about whether the sex offenders' register means anything.

I welcome the fact that the Independent Police Complaints Commission is to investigate the way the police monitored Peter Chapman.

And I look forward to their findings being made public.

So far, Merseyside Police has said that an internal review was carried out following Chapman's arrest and "a number of procedural improvements were identified and subsequently implemented".

What were those improvements? Did they involve disciplinary action against those officers who were supposed to be keeping a close eye on Chapman?

The Ashleigh Hall case has exposed a shambles at the heart of Britain's procedures for dealing with the worst type of criminals imaginable.

Now we expect the Government to take action to make sure that paedophiles like Chapman are placed under meaningful scrutiny.

Tomorrow morning's paper will keep up the pressure.