Police reform budget

I was in Parliament today giving evidence to the Justice Committee on the police reform budget.


My written evidence tells the sorry story of the half baked business case that wasn't even completed before Parliament passed the Police and Fire Reform Bill. Then the shambles over VAT liability, when Treasury officials had told the Government that if you organise police and fire this way, the Scottish taxpayer will pay the VAT.

This results in a major savings target that would be challenging enough. However, the Scottish Government has an arbitrary target to maintain police officer numbers at 17,234, therefore the cuts are concentrated on police staffs. Up to 3000 posts are likely to go with the gaps being filled by police officers. A recent survey indicates that up to 2000 police officers will be taken off operational duties, at least in part, to backfill the posts. So much for the promised 1000 extra police officers “on the streets”.

The latest ACPOS cuts proposals give us some indication of the numbers of posts and these are set out in some detail in my evidence.

Some of these cuts (HR, finance and corporate services) are aimed at economies of scale created by one centralised police force. However, past experience of such savings is that they are rarely achieved and certainly not without passing the workload onto operational staff.

The vast majority of these job cuts can only be achieved by substituting police officers for the roles currently undertaken by police staffs. These include custody staff, front office, traffic wardens, licensing staff, clerical support, intelligence gathering, control room and forensic staff. This is already happening with police officers being drafted in, typically at twice the salary, to undertake these duties. 

At today's evidence session there was at least a greater recognition that backfilling is wrong. Although some senior officers are still turning a blind eye to what is happening on the ground. I would challenge any politician to just walk around any police headquarters and see how many police officers are there, not on the streets. A week does not go by without a member telling us of even more officers taken off operational roles to undertake police staff jobs.

Taking trained operational police officers off the streets to perform administrative or specialist tasks – at greater cost, is economic madness. It is also contrary to the Best Value provisions in the Act. This will return the police service in Scotland to almost the 1980‟s, with inefficient and outdated police practice. The Sweeney may be back on our cinema screens, but it isn't a model for a modern police force.

The sensible way forward should be to let the Scottish Police Authority and the Chief Constable decide the correct balance of police officers and police staff using Best Value principles. They should not be subject to a political direction that effectively restricts cuts to police staffs.