When Sarah Payne went missing in West Sussex, more than 100 people volunteered to search for her.

They were ordinary people brought together by a common urge to help the police in every way they could.

Sadly, Sarah had been abducted and killed by Roy Whiting who is now in prison.

Many of the volunteers felt a lot of time wasted in trying to organise them could have been devoted to the search.

They took action and started a Neighbourhood Watch search team which will save police much bureaucracy should there ever be another hunt of that scale.

These caring people have formed a permanent data base of volunteers who can be called up by officers at a moment's notice.

Today they are taking part in a police search exercise which will find out how good the system is and whether there is room for improvement.

Since the death of Sarah, volunteers have already been called out by the police to assist them in other cases where people, young and old, have gone missing.

None of them has been anything like as high profile as the disappearance of Sarah. But in each case, volunteers were able to give invaluable support to the police.

If some good has come out of Sarah's death, it is this willing army of volunteers able to act quickly and take part of the burden from the shoulders of police.