Only half of police drivers involved in high-speed chases that ended in death or serious injury were fully trained in pursuit, an official watchdog reported yesterday.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission said that police officers took “unnecessary risks” when chasing suspects. “There is a fine balance to be struck in controlling crime by dealing with someone who is driving recklessly, and increasing the risk to public safety by engaging in dangerous high-speed pursuit,” the IPCC’s report concluded.

“If an officer decides to pursue someone there is the risk that the person will drive more recklessly to escape and therefore present greater danger to themselves and others on the road.”

The commission called for a mandatory code of practice for officers involved in pursuits in an effort to cut a rising toll of deaths and injuries.

Its report was published 24 hours after five people died in a head-on collision on the M4 in South Wales, apparently caused when a car drove in the wrong direction along the motorway to escape a police pursuit. The police did not follow it.

Three young men in the car died, as did the occupants of the vehicle they hit, James and Bridget Stafford, both 70, who were returning to Surrey from a holiday in Ireland.

About 40 people die each year in road accidents involving police vehicles. The report studied 275 incidents, resulting in 115 deaths, which were referred to the IPCC between April 2004 and September 2006. Although the number of chases in which someone dies is small compared with the thousands of times that vehicles are pursued each year, road accidents are the largest single cause of deaths involving the police.

The IPCC report painted a picture of young men in their twenties – often under the influence of drink and drugs – being chased by male police officers, half of whom had not had advanced driver training. Those being chased were often suspected of motoring offences. In one incident highlighted in the report, a Kent police officer chased a motorcycle because its rider and pillion passenger were not wearing crash helmets. The incident ended with the police car hitting the motorcycle, whose 15-year-old rider was taken to hospital with a fractured collarbone.

The report said: “The most common way for the pursuit to end was for the pursued vehicle to collide either with a wall or tree, an unrelated vehicle, or street furniture.”

The IPCC recommended that all police vehicles be fitted with data recorders and that some types of police vehicle, including vans and 4x4s, should not be used for chasing suspects because of their limited handling capabilities.

The report also recommended that police should not pursue people on motorcycles or mini-motorcycles, except where a serious crime had been committed.

However, figures in the report show that 28 per cent of the vehicles pursued by police had been stolen. It also said that 60 per cent of drivers stopped after high-speed chases were over the drink-drive limit, 61 per cent had no insurance and 16 per cent had no licence or a provisional licence.

Nick Hardwick, chairman of the IPCC, said: “Pursuits of motorcycles can be particularly dangerous as the rider is much more vulnerable than a driver or occupant of a car.” He said that pursuit was a necessary police tactic but a high-risk one which had to be used carefully.

Mr Hardwick added: “Many of the police pursuits we deal with are of short duration and involve split-second decisions by officers. This emphasises the need for strong and clear regulation of this area of policing.”

Andy Holt, Assistant Chief Constable of South Yorkshire, said the report had led to the Association of Chief Police Officers initiating a review of its guidelines on pursuits.

Tony McNulty, the Police Minister, said: “The ability to pursue is a useful and possibly vital tactic for the police. To lose that ability to pursue would be very damaging. However, the IPCC’s work shows that pursuits must be conducted as safely as possible.”

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