Police are solving almost 13% of burglaries in Hertfordshire, bringing the force close to the top 10 performing constabularies in the country.

Chief Constable Andy Prophet told Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) Jonathan Ash-Edwards that the figure represents a stark improvement from its previous success rate of just 4% – which was one of the worst in England and Wales.

The PCC asked the chief constable for an update on initiatives to drive up arrests for burglaries during their monthly performance and accountability meeting.

Mr Prophet said: "We're arresting and locking up far more burglars. I'm happy to share that progress has continued since the update in March.

"Since February, we really kind of turned our attention to this and said we must do better. We've seen the percentage of burglaries we solve go from an almost worst in the country, 4%, to closer to the top 10 in the country, nearly 13%, of burglaries being solved.

"My ambition hasn't stopped there; I'd like to solve even more. In February, we solved 19 house burglaries, in March 10, in April 35, in May 18.

"These are again relatively low numbers, so we're really starting to see a two- or threefold increase in the number of burglars we're catching and people we're convicting. We've done that by creating a dedicated team. We've got patterns across burglary; quite often it's organised across borders, and we've got tactics and capabilities that I think we're driving into that.

"It's really promising, it's really great work. To give one example of a complex investigation that came to its conclusion in recent months, Operation Ghostlock linked 31 different burglaries and eight attempted burglaries and 32 cars that were stolen."

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Five offenders were arrested as a result of cross-border work led by Hertfordshire investigators in Operation Ghostlock. Four of the five have since pleaded guilty and are currently remanded in custody while awaiting sentencing.

The chief constable said it was "one example of many successes" where the force used a "laser-like approach" to detect burglars.

He added: "The team we've built is a dedicated team; it's how we do business now, and that's how we'll carry on. It's detectives, it's embedded analysts. That's their job. When they wake up in the morning, they're thinking about catching burglars, and when they come to work, they do catch burglars.

"We've got forensic strategies, we've got detectives doing first response to burglary, so not just the response officer, but detectives turning up and looking at the evidential opportunities.

"We've got really clear processes where we do lock up offenders. We then go and revisit them and bring them out of prison to talk about other offending they may have committed that it's now in their interest to talk to us about, so we can clear up other offending.

"So, there's just a huge range of things we now have in place that will continue and [which] gives me confidence that we'll be able to sustain the improved levels of performance."