POLICE officers are being taught Polish in a bid to communicate with the thousands of Polish workers who have come to East Lancashire.

Bosses have made cash available for officers to learn foreign languages and one of the most popular choices are lessons in Polish.

Police chiefs believe the move will help build relations with new European workers in the area.

It is said that Polish workers often have a mistrust of the police due to bad experiences in their homeland and come to the county with little or no English Sergeant John Rigby, of Blackburn police's ethnic mino-rity team, said: "We believe languages help officers broaden their outlook and break down communication barriers.

"The problem is we are now spoilt for choice as there are so many different language courses on offer and we have a lot of officers and PCSOs who are bi-lingual. "

Officers are already taking advantage of the courses.

PC Neil Lever, who had taken a course in Polish, attended a road traffic accident involving a Polish HGV driver.

The driver knew very little English but the situation was resolved thanks to PC Lever being able to use Polish phrases to communicate with the injured driver.

A spokesman for Lancashire Police said: "Under our training and qualifications policy we do offer funding and support should an officer take on an adult education course.

"Lancashire Constabul-ary takes the training of its officers very seriously and encourages its staff in any aspect of training they feel would improve their ability to perform the role the public expects of them.

"If an officer felt they would benefit from a qualification in a foreign language we would offer support through partial or full funding and time off to attend the course.

"Being able to break down communication barriers is fundamental to being able to build good relationships within the new communities to keep those communities safe and crime free."

Witold Stachowski and his wife Agnieszka moved to Accrington and opened Polish delicatessen DaDa in Accrington Road, Blackburn, to cater for the 3,000 ex-pats living in East Lancashire.

Agnieszka said: "I think this is a really good idea.

"Some Poles who live in this area may be a little dubious of the police due to bad experiences in the past."

Since Poland joined the European Union in 2004, 98,000 workers have arrived in the UK.