Justice Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Official Report 532KB pdf

Justice Sub-Committee on Policing (Report Back)

Agenda item 5 is feedback from the Justice Sub-Committee on Policing on its meeting of 19 April. Following the verbal report, there will be an opportunity for brief comments or questions. I refer members to paper 6, which is a note by the clerk. I invite John Finnie, as the convener of the sub-committee, to provide feedback.

As you say, the Justice Sub-Committee on Policing met on 19 April, when we took evidence on Police Scotland’s review of its custody provision from: Chief Superintendent Garry McEwan of the criminal justice services division of Police Scotland; Calum Steele, the general secretary of the Scottish Police Federation; and Lucille Inglis, chair of the police staff Scotland branch of Unison Scotland.

The sub-committee heard that, although the number of people being taken into police custody has been reduced and there have been improvements to Police Scotland’s custody provision, there remain a number of custody issues to be resolved. One is the continued use of police officers to backfill vacant police custody and security officer—PCSO—posts. Another issue is that some PCSOs are working alone in custody centres, which is not best practice and, although 70 new staff are to be employed by July, there are doubts about whether that is sufficient to fully resource the custody centres. Although the number of prisoners being transferred on long journeys has reduced, that still occurs, and the issue is exacerbated by an increase in custody processing times.

The sub-committee agreed to keep the issue under review. It also considered its forward work programme and agreed to request information from Police Scotland on its information and communications technology strategy.

I am happy to take any questions.

Do members have any questions or comments? Some important issues were raised in the sub-committee that we should certainly monitor, such as the delays in processing and how the new restriction of liberty orders are working.

That is a fair point, convener. It is probably worth reflecting that Calum Steele offered to follow up on some of the bureaucratic issues that appear to be arising out of the new forms. It is up to the sub-committee to consider how it responds to that invitation, but we probably need to explore that issue in more detail.

That concludes the public part of today’s meeting. Our next meeting will be on 1 May, when we will take evidence on the proposed integration of the British Transport Police in Scotland into Police Scotland.