Officers working for Thames Valley Police’s roads policing team said the incident happened in the Wantage area on Wednesday.

The driver was arrested on suspicion of multiple offences, including dangerous driving, failing to stop for police, driving without a licence, driving without insurance, and drug driving.

READ MORE: Reports of unexploded bomb in Oxfordshire

The force’s roads policing team said: “When we say ‘pull over’, it’s not a suggestion.

“Yesterday in the Wantage area, officers encountered a motorist who chose to treat a police stop as optional. For clarity it isn’t.

“During the attempted getaway, the driver’s standard of driving quickly dropped well below anything resembling safe or competent.

Thames Valley Police (Image: Thames Valley Police stock image)

“The journey included a collision with a bollard, followed by the car shedding an entire wheel.

“Now running on three wheels, the vehicle continued into a rural village before finally coming to a stop.

“Officers detained the driver promptly before anything else decided to part company with the car.”

The investigation is continuing.

But some fans of the series set in Cambridge, starring David Mitchell, will be disappointed to hear that Gerran Howell is not returning in the role of DC Simon Evans.

Series one of the detective drama was a huge hit in 2024, becoming the channel’s biggest new scripted show since 2022. It attracted more than 9.5 million viewers across 28 days.

READ MORE: Second series of hit detective drama is expected soon

Now a second series is expected to be shown soon in 2026, although a transmission date has yet to be revealed.

David Mitchell will return as John ‘Ludwig’ Taylor, while Anna Maxwell Martin will also be back as his sister-in-law, Lucy Betts-Taylor.

Best known for his role in the comedy Peep Show, David Mitchell was born in Headington and was a pupil at Abingdon School, before going to university at Oxford University’s New College.

Speaking with Radio Times, Gerran Howell, who currently stars as Dr Dennis Whitaker in The Pitt, was asked if he will appear in future episodes of Ludwig.

“Unfortunately not, no,” he replied. “I hope the door is still open, because I really love that show.”

Gerran Howell (Image: BBC/Big Talk Studios)

Cast as DC Simon Evans, Howell was a comic figure in the first series, often appearing to be one of the last members of the police team to realise who had committed a murder.

Following the release of season one, which premiered in 2024, the show received positive reviews, with fans comparing it to the iconic Oxford-based detective drama, Inspector Morse.

Renewed for a second instalment, the BBC has confirmed that filming has now started on season two of Ludwig.

David Mitchell, Anna Maxwell Martin and Dylan Hughes in Ludwig (Image: BBC/Big Talk Studios/Olly Courtney)

Picking up from where the plot was left at the end of series one, master puzzle-setter John ‘Ludwig’ Taylor is now a crime scene consultant working on ‘impossible’ crimes for the Cambridge Police Authority.

When asked how his official role on the police team would shake things up in the new episodes, Mitchell said: “When you watch the second series, you realise there’s still quite a lot of obfuscation involved in his role, because not everyone in the police force is entirely on side with his appointment.

“And of course, he’s still got to cover up the fact that for a long time he was solving cases while impersonating a police officer. And if that ever gets out, well, five murderers will walk free, and he won’t walk free himself.”

The comic actor was recently crowned the winner of the second season of TV series Last One Laughing UK.

He is also a regular on TV panel show Would I Lie To You?

Mitchell and Lee Mack appear as team captains while Rob Brydon is the host.

Premier Inn owner Whitbread is to cut about 3,800 jobs in the UK and Ireland and shut its remaining Beefeater and Brewers Fayre restaurants as it resets its five-year business strategy, amid tax rises.

In recent years, Whitbread has invested heavily in new Premier Inn hotels across Oxfordshire including those in Abingdon, and in Oxford city centre opposite the Westgate Centre, and at Botley.

READ MORE: Oxford Beefeater among most ‘in trouble’

While some Premier Inn hotels in the county now have restaurants converted to the chain’s in-house Thyme brand, a few old-fashioned Beefeater and Brewers Fayre restaurants remain.

They include the Longwall Beefeater in Cowley, Bicester Premier Inn (Brewers Fayre), the Beefeater restaurant at Oxford Kidlington (Airport) Hotel, and the Applecart Beefeater at the Premier Inn for Didcot.

The cuts will affect about 12 per cent of Whitbread’s 30,000-strong workforce in the UK and Ireland working in its Beefeater and Brewers Fayre restaurants, which are usually located next to, or inside, Premier Inn hotels. The company said consultations with affected employees would begin immediately.

Whitbread said it expected to retain a “significant proportion” of staff affected and would try to find them alternative roles, given it hires about 15,000 people each year.

The country’s largest hotel operator had already started converting some of its underperforming Beefeater and Brewers Fayre restaurants into hotel rooms and now intends to continue the policy across the remaining 197 restaurants.

The move will involve Whitbread selling and leasing back £1.5bn of its freehold properties.

Dominic Paul, Whitbread’s chief executive, said: “We plan to convert all our remaining branded restaurants to an integrated food and beverage offer that is preferred by our hotel guests and will unlock the addition of more highly profitable extension rooms.

“Our continued efforts to drive our commercial plan and efficiencies will extend our market-leading position and allow us to take share from our competitors, many of which are struggling to grow.”

The Premier Inn in Abingdon (Image: Andy Ffrench)

Whitbread warned in late 2025 that Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ 2025 budget tax policies would cost it an extra £50m this year, amid changes to the way business rates are calculated. This followed an earlier cost squeeze from higher wage bills and rising food prices.

There are more than 800 Premier Inn hotels in the UK.

The Beefeater restaurant brand – established in 1974 and known for serving steaks and classic pub dishes – as well as the Brewers Fayre chain are now expected to disappear from UK high streets.

Diners in Abingdon were upset when the Ock Mill Beefeater restaurant attached to the former Premier Inn in Marcham Road closed in 2023. The building is now owned by The Unicorn School and is being converted into classrooms.

The job cuts warning came as Whitbread reported that its revenues for the year to February 26 were ‘flat’ compared with the same period a year earlier.