Cumbria's chief constable has revealed his force is dealing with potentially hundreds of victims of sexual abuse - and alleged offences going back 30 years.

Jerry Graham, revealing the scale of sex crime investigations facing officers, said some of the investigations were complex and would take years to complete.

Speaking before county councillors at a meeting, Mr Graham explained how the work of police had changed dramatically, with an increasing focus on safeguarding vulnerable people.

He urged councillors to exploit the opportunities where the council, agencies and police could work together.

Mr Graham said: "Police officers are now operating in an environment that would have been unrecognisable even five years ago.

"There has been a substantial change and increase in the complexity of demand and the amount of time it takes with incidents has changed so much."

He cited a recent example where Cumbria Police arrested a man on suspicion of making indecent images.

His computer, phones, USB sticks and game consoles were taken and examined for 17 days and revealed 3.7million indecent images.

All those images were examined to see if any victims could be identified and a total of 422 potential child victims were identified - many of whom were outside the UK.

The man was charged with 19 serious sexual offences.