Justice Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Official Report 630KB pdf

---

Justice Sub-Committee on Policing (Report Back)

Agenda item 8 is feedback from the Justice Sub-Committee on Policing on its meeting of 22 February 2018. Following the verbal report, there will be an opportunity for brief comments or questions.

I refer members to paper 4, which is a note by the clerk, and invite John Finnie to provide feedback.

Thank you, convener.

The Justice Sub-Committee on Policing met last Thursday and took evidence on Durham Constabulary’s reports on its investigations into Police Scotland’s former counter-corruption unit. We heard evidence from Chief Constable Michael Barton and Darren Ellis, who is a senior investigator from Durham Constabulary.

Mr Barton told the committee that he had concerns about Police Scotland changing the remit from an investigation to an inquiry and about obstruction, particularly from Police Scotland’s legal department. He expressed the view that Police Scotland is “risk averse” and that it had adopted an unnecessarily prolonged process.

The Justice Sub-Committee on Policing intends to take further evidence. We will hear from Police Scotland on the issue on 15 March.

We wrote to Police Scotland and the Scottish Police Authority to seek an urgent assurance that Police Scotland will not destroy any evidence or data until the applicants have consented. That relates to the information that underpins much of what we discussed.

I am happy to take questions.

Do members have any questions or comments?

The evidence that we took was quite extraordinary in three key regards. First, it was refreshing to receive such blunt and straightforward evidence. Secondly, there were a number of issues relating to prior police conduct, and the observation was made that evidence had simply been invented, which was quite extraordinary. Thirdly, Police Scotland’s conduct with regard to its help or otherwise in Durham Constabulary’s work was quite extraordinary.

For those reasons, I encourage all members who are not members of the Justice Sub-Committee on Policing to read the evidence that we took in the meeting, which is in the Official Report, because it was very significant.

I agree whole-heartedly with Daniel Johnson. We went into the meeting with the impression that the evidence that we would receive would be quite striking, but what we heard and the way in which it was presented took many of us a bit by surprise. I think that the evidence of future witnesses will be judged by the Bartonmeter.

There are serious questions for Police Scotland and, by extension, for the SPA. As Daniel Johnson said, it would be useful for colleagues who are not members of the sub-committee to have sight of the responses, because I am sure that they would be of interest to them.

Yes. Most concerning of all was that what had been set up as an inquiry turned out, at the end of the day, to be a review because of police interference. Clearly, that is not acceptable.

It is a matter of huge concern that the complainants—who were the reason for the probe—seemed to be an afterthought. There are multiple areas for the sub-committee to review following last week’s evidence-taking session.

On what the chief constable of Durham Constabulary, perhaps reasonably, expected to be the scope of what he was doing, it is fair to record that that is not—and never has been—the position of Police Scotland. The investigation role was undertaken ultimately by the Police Service of Northern Ireland. However, there is a need to consider whether the process is unduly cumbersome.

Comments were made about risk aversion. I highlight the impact that that had on the victims of what was acknowledged to be illegal behaviour by Police Scotland. We have to look at that aspect, as well as what was said about the lack of co-operation from Police Scotland’s legal department.

As we know, the main people involved are no longer part of Police Scotland and a new regime is in place. However, we will certainly want full and frank disclosure of all the information and not selective disclosure as we have had historically.

John Finnie’s points are entirely reasonable. On the additional concern, to which the convener referred, about pastoral care for those who were, as Mike Barton suggested, “gravely wronged” by what happened, no steps seem to have been taken in the interim to engage with the complainants and to provide—or even to identify—the support that might be appropriate for them. That was left to Durham Constabulary.

We have heard consistently from Deputy Chief Constable Livingstone about police wellbeing being a priority and a concern that is laced through the policing 2026 strategy. However, it is difficult to reconcile that with what we have seen here.

I think that we will have an opportunity to return to all those issues.

Thank you for those comments, which are duly noted.

That concludes our seventh meeting in 2018. The committee will next meet on 6 March, when it will continue stage 2 of the Civil Litigation (Expenses and Group Proceedings) (Scotland) Bill and take evidence on alternate dispute resolutions.

Meeting closed at 12:37.