Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I welcome everyone to the public meeting of the Justice Committee. I remind everyone to switch off mobile phones.
The committee asked of us three specific questions, so I will refer to them briefly. First, on the importance of ensuring the continued quality and potential of police recruits, I can say broadly that we are experiencing no problems with either the level of interest shown or the quality of those who apply to join the police service. The number applying far outweighs the number of positions that are available, so recruiting is generally going very well. In recent months, the pool of individuals who are interested in joining the service seems to have widened. Things are quite positive in that respect.
That was very useful. You have anticipated some of our questions. There will be questions specifically for Strathclyde, at which stage Chief Constable House can be involved.
Good morning, gentlemen. The Scottish Government published figures earlier this year that indicated that by the end of June, there were 1,000 more police officers in Scotland than there were in June 2007. Do you expect the increased numbers to be sustained through 2010-11? I invite Chief Constable Shearer to have first cut at that.
You probably made the question easier by restricting it to 2010-11—maintaining numbers will be a challenge for us during that time. At the moment, we do not know exactly what level of budget local authorities will feed through to every police force. The big challenge is to maintain our numbers. We could get to the position where we are just about level in 2010-11, but looking beyond that point, it is important to be realistic. Every forecast that we look at shows cuts in the public sector somewhere in the region of 12 per cent over the next three to four years. If that is the case, some adjustments will have to be made to the profile because it cannot happen overnight. I suppose the question is: how important is policing? Our real desire is to maintain numbers at their current level and, more important, to maintain performance and improve it.
I understand that maintaining numbers and performance is your aspiration and desire. I am restricted to asking about the situation in 2010-11; another committee member will ask about further in the future. However, you said that it would be a challenge to maintain numbers because you are not yet certain what level of budget each police force will get. I am sure that each police force will have estimated the range of budget that it hopes to get. If estimates turn out to be roughly correct, will it still be a challenge or will it be down to the wire in being able to just maintain numbers and the quality that we all want?
If the estimates are correct and we get what we want, we should just be able to maintain our levels. There will be no difficulties with the quality of the service, because significant numbers of people are still interested in joining the service. However, there is no doubt that things will be really tight. The challenge for us is to maintain the front-line numbers.
You say that things will be really tight. We have just assumed the best, but let us assume the worst. Is there any possibility that you will not be able to maintain numbers throughout 2010-11?
Yes, it is a possibility. It would be foolish of me to sit here and say, "Absolutely, we are able to maintain our numbers." However, our real desire is to work at that level. Every force will have looked at profiles of what it might mean if budgets are not at the level that is hoped for.
Is that situation a possibility just on the edges, almost 50:50 or right down to the wire? Is it edging towards being a probability?
I suppose the difficulty today is exactly what our budget settlements will be. Every force will have looked closely at budgets and done scenario planning to forecast how much budgets will drop by if they are not quite on the line. A realistic picture is being taken so that we can flex our numbers as required, but we certainly do not anticipate increasing them.
Does anyone else want to have a shot at those questions about 2010-11? Other members will ask about future years.
The overall answer to your question is yes, I think that we will be able to maintain numbers. However, to use the same language that Pat Shearer used, it will be a challenge. The extra funding of £6 million to bring in officers next year will assist in that, but that is not the real question. We have just over 8,000 officers in Strathclyde; as Pat Shearer mentioned, some of those officers—currently 193—are funded by local authorities. I have to speak to the 12 local authorities in Strathclyde to assess their mood and how they feel about funding, which is becoming clearer.
I am grateful for that. As my questions were restricted to 2010-11, it will be interesting to hear your responses to my colleagues, although we can probably all guess what they will be.
We anticipate that the forthcoming financial year might have some difficulties, and that the picture thereafter will be somewhat bleaker. To explore that further, I invite Angela Constance to ask the appropriate questions.
Gentlemen, I am interested in the scenario in which the world does not end in 2010-11. Do the spending proposals for the police in 2010-11 provide a firm foundation for sustaining police numbers beyond March 2011? Perhaps Mr Shearer will start.
Like you, I hope that the world will not end in 2011. Looking beyond then, however, we must be realistic, because every prediction suggests that there will be a significant reduction in the public sector budget. If that is passed on across the range of public sector organisations, there will probably be a 12 per cent reduction in three or four years. In addition, it is important to understand that demand in the police service over that period is estimated to continue to grow—it could grow by as much as 8 per cent. There could therefore be a gap between resources and demand of about 20 per cent after four years. I therefore think it unlikely that, under the current arrangements, we will be able to maintain our numbers during that time. Local authorities will be unlikely not to pass on to us the reductions that they suffer. That may invite a change of position for the Government regarding whether it should consider reverting to ring fencing. It depends on how policing is valued in challenging times.
May I ask you a somewhat obvious question? Can you say a bit more about what you based your predictions on? I can guess, but it would be useful to hear a bit more about that.
The predictions are from a range of areas. We considered the Government's best current predictions and presentations from others. The Westminster Government estimates that growth in excess of 3 per cent will be returned by 2011. We have never been in that position in the past eight to 10 years, so I think that it is unrealistic to estimate that.
Do other panel members want to comment?
Mr Cross might have something to add.
On whether the 2010-11 budget provides a firm base for going forward, a significant factor for police officer numbers is that the Scottish Government funds the 1,000 additional officers. The first important point is whether that funding will continue. Secondly, as Pat Shearer said, there is uncertainty regarding the local government settlement and how that will impact on the constituent authorities, how they in turn will consider the pressures and how that will impact on the police budget. Thirdly, we have been fortunate enough to generate significant efficiency savings, which we have been able to reinvest in the policing service to augment operational delivery. Some of that has contributed to the increase in police numbers. If we have to use efficiency savings in times of much stricter financial settlements to meet budget cuts, it will not be possible to maintain the additional police officer numbers that have come from the efficiency savings.
Do other members of the panel wish to add anything?
Most of it has been said, frankly. However, as members are well aware, our difficulty is that 90 per cent of police funding is for people, whereas funding for people in local government tends to be about 60 or 65 per cent. The police therefore have much less to play with. ACPOS is very interested in Arbuthnott's look at sharing services and joint working, as is Strathclyde. Efficiencies can therefore be seized, but that quickly translates into reducing the numbers of people. As I said, we have just over 8,000 officers, and we are determined to maintain that number. However, the question is how we do that. I do not sign up to the view that police numbers are an artificial construct, or an artifice, and that it is really about results and outcomes. If we manage effectively, we get better outcomes with the right number of people. The number of police officers is therefore vital. We will do all that we can to protect the number of police officers that we have. We will not go to that as the first card in the pack and say, "Right, we'll have to reduce that." We will try to do everything else that we can first, before we do that. However, the 90 per cent figure does not leave an awful lot of room for us to go anywhere else.
Mr Cross somewhat anticipated my next question. Mr Shearer referred in his opening remarks to £28 million in efficiency savings and said that it would be a challenge to maintain that level. What progress is being made with efficiency savings, and what scope is there for further efficiency savings in 2010-11 and beyond?
As you rightly point out, the forces collectively generated savings in the region of £29 million in 2008-09 against a target of £17 million. Obviously, it is encouraging that we managed to identify an additional £12 million of savings. Most of the savings came from considering staffing and asking whether functions could be performed more effectively. Some structural changes therefore contributed to about £6 million of the savings. Civilianisation of posts that did not require police powers saved another £6 million, but some of that money has been reinvested in additional police officers. Sickness absence across the eight forces generated savings of about £2.7 million. Procurement generated about £2.2 million, and a one-off sale of property generated £2.6 million. All those areas accounted for about 90 per cent of the savings that were generated.
Thank you. Does any other member of the panel wish to add anything?
It is important to distinguish between efficiency savings and their application in closing a budget deficit. If efficiency savings must increasingly, as we expect, be applied to close future budget deficits, that must have an implication for staff numbers. If we must release cash to close that gap, we must look at the level of resources. At the moment, we have been successful in reinvesting freed-up resources, particularly the time of police officers and support staff. However, if it is necessary to generate the cash equivalent, we need to consider reducing the numbers. There is a danger that, because of our success in the past, there may be a perception that, if we continue to generate the same level of efficiency savings, that will go a long way towards closing a budget deficit. However, a clear distinction must be made in considering the implications of that strategy.
Chief Constable House, let me take you back to the point that you made in connection with the need to maintain the numbers at 8,000. It touches on a point that Mr Macleod made, as well. If we are unable to do that, will that result in the possibility of redundancies for police officers? Is that scenario a possibility if we have to reduce staff numbers?
For technical reasons, that is not a possibility. We cannot make police officers redundant because we are not, by that strict definition, employed in the first place. However, it would result in police support staff redundancies, either voluntary or compulsory. We would make those staff redundant first. We would also slow down the recruiting tap. We are at the back end of the 30-year Edmund-Davies effect. There was a big increase in the number of police officer recruits 30 years ago, and they have now reached the end of their pensionable service. As they left, we would not replace them. In the past 12 months, Strathclyde Police has recruited 1,400 officers to grow but also to replace the officers who have left through natural retirement. If we had a budget deficit that we could not fill through efficiencies or any other measure, we would simply not replace the officers who retired and the number of officers would start to drift down in that way.
So, if those particular figures did not match the police numbers—if there was still a deficit after that process of slowing down recruitment—it would be the support staff who would face any cuts that had to be made.
No. I am afraid that I take a fairly clear position on that. The public want to see police officers; therefore, we would turn first to the police support staff for voluntary redundancies. Strathclyde Police already has a voluntary redundancy policy in place and we would seek to use that. At some point, if we could not balance the books, we would have to consider compulsory redundancies. I would look to shrink the police staff numbers before I shrunk police officer numbers. Reducing police officer numbers would be my last resort.
I am surprised by that answer. In the past, we have heard that having support staff behind the scenes, back at the base, assists the police in carrying out their duties. Do you want to respond to my surprise at your statement?
I am happy to respond to your surprise. I agree with you entirely. The work that police support staff do behind the scenes—sometimes it is not behind the scenes but out at the front—is vital to us. I am saying that such staff are a need-to-have rather than a nice-to-have, but when it comes to a choice between reducing the number of police officers and reducing the number of police staff, I will choose to reduce the number of police staff and to retain police officers, because police officers offer a flexibility of deployment that police staff do not. By law, I can tell any of my 8,000 officers that I want to change their duties. I need to give them relatively little notice, as long as there is a reasonable reason for taking such action. With police staff, we do not have that ability. We employ people to do particular tasks, such as input on a computer. I cannot say to them one week, "I now need you to be a custodian of prisoners," because it does not work that way. With police officers, it does work that way—it is possible to do that.
In answer to another question, you said that 90 per cent of the budget went on people—that figure probably relates to Strathclyde Police. Do you know what percentage of the budget is spent on police officers and what percentage of it is spent on backroom staff? I would like to have that information for the Strathclyde area and for the whole of Scotland, if ACPOS can provide it.
For us—and I do not think that it would be very different for other forces—the ratio is about 4:1, so for every £1 we spend on police staff, we spend £4 on police officers. We spend the vast predominance on police officers.
I want to ask about the Scottish Police Services Authority and its somewhat vexed history, which all members of the committee have been disappointed with. Has there been any improvement in relationships? One would hope that that would enable savings to be achieved on a Scotland-wide basis, which might help everyone's budgets.
I doubt that significant savings will be delivered in the next two or three years. The challenge for the SPSA is to stabilise and support services at the current level.
Cathie Craigie has a further point on that.
I have questions about every paragraph, never mind every page, of ACPOS's submission, but we do not have the time to deal with them.
Let us look at some of the areas that we highlight. In the management of sex and violent offenders, greater awareness and responsibility are being developed all the time. The increasing fluidity of our population makes the management process more challenging, with the result that demands, not just for our service but across the agencies, are more significant.
Do you feel that the draft budget does not take account of the burden that you have to undertake in that regard?
I do not think that it has, in the past, and the difficulty is that we do not know what the budget will be for 2010-11. Undoubtedly, that is a growing area for us, but it is probably one of the areas in which, if we are going to be successful in meeting our challenges, we will have to ensure that our partnership working is improved, so that we can deliver on some of our priorities. Our service and other agencies should challenge one another to work together in better ways, so that we can deliver on those priorities.
You talked about issues around ring fencing and the ways in which local authorities make decisions. In last year's allocations, did local authorities supply the police authorities with the budget that had been intended?
Absolutely. The local authorities across the country supported us well. However, that was in a position of growth, and we are now seeing a levelling off of that position. Local authorities will face a challenge in the face of the £174 million saving that must be achieved in the 2010-11 budget. How much of that will be passed on to our service? As we go beyond 2011, a requirement to make savings will undoubtedly be passed on. That is why we raised the issue of ring fencing. If we are not careful, we could end up with a range of approaches being taken by local authorities across the country. That situation will be quite difficult for Stephen House, who will have to deal with 12 separate authorities.
As Pat Shearer mentioned, local authorities were as supportive as they could be last year in meeting their share of the funding. However, one of the challenges that faced local authorities and us last year was the fact that not all of the funding for police pensions was in the police settlement. That pensions problem was shared between local authorities and police forces to varying degrees. We will not have that particular problem in 2010-11 because of the new pension arrangements, but the ways in which various local authorities deal with their share of the £174 million cuts will bring about another set of problems.
I understand that additional funding from the Government has resolved the pension problem. Is that correct?
Yes. That will not be an issue for 2010-11.
The ACPOS submission mentions that there are additional costs in relation to the management of sex offenders and violent offenders. What exactly are those additional costs? The staff and officers are in place, after all. Do the additional costs involve extra paperwork? Could you quantify them?
The costs are difficult to quantify. Over the years, we have developed the process of managing sex offenders to apply to the formal management of violent offenders. That was not on the official radar in some respects and, while it might have been being done in other ways, a much more structured approach is now taken to the management of violent offenders, so there is more paperwork and the necessary support elements need to be in place to ensure delivery, not just in the police service but across social work and criminal justice. It is difficult to quantify, but there is a definite additional burden and responsibility in that respect.
I acknowledge that things have been formalised and that there is now an increased focus. I am thinking specifically about your responsibilities, rather than social work and so on. I understand that the arrangements are more focused and formalised, with a more formal paperwork process and paper trail. You said earlier that about 90 per cent of your costs are your staff. Those staff must be paid, regardless of whether the process that they follow is formal or informal, and of whether or not we change the management of sex offenders or violent offenders. What additional costs do the police have to bear because of such changes? I am not clear what the additional costs are, given that the staff are already in place.
We are probably talking about additional staff. As soon as a structure is put in place to replace what might have been an informal and less rigorous approach to the management of violent offenders, there will undoubtedly be additional costs. I cannot quantify that for you at the moment, but there are undoubtedly additional responsibilities.
I do not want to labour the point, but it would be helpful if you could quantify, or at least attempt to quantify, how many additional staff you had to recruit to deal with those additional demands. That would help us to understand what budget changes have resulted from those changes in managing violent offenders.
Could we come back to the committee on that?
Yes, absolutely.
It would be helpful If you could write to us about that.
Before I continue, I return to Chief Constable House's earlier comments about what might happen in the event of budget pressures and a reduction in staff.
There was a general view in policing that the sum of cash that was used to employ one police officer could be used to employ two members of police staff. One police officer would no longer be employed, and the salary saved could be used to buy two members of police staff. They could be given jobs that had been done by officers, which would release two police officers on to the street. That was the obvious managerial option but, although it is a fine concept, it does not work in reality. For a start, police staff are no longer paid at such a level. The uplift from putting police staff on shift work is usually about 20 per cent, which raises those staff to a level at which they are being paid the same as probationary constables. I ask you to look at the community support officer posts that are widespread in England and Wales. Community support officers get paid more than starting probationary constables. There is not a huge financial benefit in that approach.
I am not disputing that. I am suggesting that if you take away support staff, the end result is similar; time has to be found for police officers to do the work that the support staff did previously. Presumably, the effect in terms of physical presence on the street has to be taken account of. I confess that I would have expected a slightly more balanced approach between the two sources of staffing.
That is true in some cases, but not in all. If you factor in the idea of sharing functions with local authorities and so on, we would lose support staff and turn to local authorities and ask whether they could provide the service for us. Obviously, we would have to pay a certain amount and we would transfer a certain number of police staff. In reality, we are saying that we might need to stop carrying out certain functions that we carry out at present. Most of those are support functions carried out by support staff.
I want to return to the budget report that went before Strathclyde police authority in August. The report identified that there was a shortfall in 2009-10 of about £7 million, which you said that you had met through efficiency savings. You also said that the equivalent figure for 2010-11 was looking like £16 million to £18 million. That rather suggests some sort of structural deficiency in the budget arrangements. What is the reason for the £7 million shortfall and the £16 million to £18 million shortfall? What makes it up? Where does it come from?
The reason for the £16 million shortfall, and the shortfall for the next couple of years, is that we have a nationally agreed police pay deal that has given pay increases of a couple of per cent each year, but our budget is not keeping up with that and there is a public sector spending squeeze, which we all understand and are trying to cope with. The people costs are going up and the budget to pay for them is dropping away. That gap is what we identified in our August paper.
I want to push you a bit further on that. We are not quite into the spectre of public sector cuts in relation to this year's budget or, to a more minor extent, in relation to 2010-11. Presumably those police pay increases were factored into the budgets that Strathclyde police authority was working with. Why does that sort of deficit emerge as the year goes on? Was it not anticipated?
In constructing the 2009-10 budget it was necessary for the force to look at budget cuts of up to £12 million. The settlement, both directly from the Government and from the local authorities, was not sufficient to meet the anticipated funding needs of Strathclyde police authority. The force itself had to generate £11 million of savings. There was the opportunity, in managing the budget from the previous year and in managing this year's budget, to identify £7 million towards that £11 million—that money was of a one-off nature. The balance was then dealt with by managing down certain savings within the existing budget. We therefore knew, in running forward this year's budget to next year's budget, that we had—as a starter for 10, so to speak—a £7 million deficit. Those one-off cuts, or savings, will not be available to the authority in 2010-11, and the authority was aware of that when it approved its 2009-10 budget. The purpose of the August paper was to remind the authority that that task was outstanding; to project what additional funding deficit might emerge in 2010-11; and to predict the impact of local authority funding, matched against the anticipated needs and the inflationary pressures that the authority would face going into 2010-11. Those £7 million cuts have to be replaced before we even begin to address any additional funding pressures in 2010-11.
That is really the point that I am getting at—it sounds as if there is a structural deficiency in the budget before you begin. Even if you produced what were standstill budgets in real terms, the deficit would simply be carried forward; you would still have to find replacement efficiency savings of some type. That will be the position year on year on year, even if everything else is even, and before you take into account any cutbacks. Have I got that broadly right?
Your comments are correct at face value, but there is not necessarily a structural fault. We knew that there was a budget deficit, and initiatives and action were taken in the force to generate more efficiency savings.
I appreciate that it is not an exact science, and that these things do not work out exactly as predicted. As I understand it, you are saying that in 2009-10, one-off savings—non-repeating savings, in other words—were the basic way of cutting the gap. However, you still have a gap that will have to be met either by one-off savings next year, and each year after that, or by more permanent savings that will feed through into a reduction in the cost line—or whatever—thereafter. Is that right?
Indeed, and we were anticipating that those on-going savings would emerge through the action that we were taking. We did not do nothing; we were addressing the fundamental issue of the £7 million deficit, and we are confident that that element will be met from efficiency savings that will generate true cash savings in 2010-11.
But you are currently working on the basis of a £16 million to £18 million deficit for 2010-11, which you say that you will be able to deal with by the end of the year. Will that be done by way of repeat savings—things that will be sustainable over time—or by using one-off efficiencies to plug a gap that is permanent rather than temporary?
The strategy for 2010-11 is evolving, and it is clear that an important element of that will involve knowing exactly what our funding situation will be. I anticipate that the overall strategy will involve a combination of on-going real permanent savings and—where the opportunity arises—one-off savings. That is the nature of managing any budget: there is always a mixture of both, and you take advantage of what is available. The important thing is that we do not rely too much on one-off savings or forget what part of the budget strategy they form, because otherwise they will creep up and hit us the next year and the year after, and so on. We are constantly reviewing those—that work is a feature of the public sector, whether we are talking about the police service, local government or whatever.
To echo Stewart Maxwell's earlier point about pensions, am I right in understanding that they are out of the equation and no longer an additional pressure because of the arrangements that will be in place from 2010-11 onwards?
Indeed. The expectation is that there will be a zero effect in terms of funding the resources that are transferred from local government and the police service to central Government, and that there will be no on-going impact on police budgets from next year.
Finally, the 6 August report to Strathclyde police authority has a schedule attached indicating the cost of the service and the growing deficit into future years. As far as I can see, it broadly assumes that the levels of grant of one sort or another that are coming in will remain static without any real-terms increases as operational costs go up. What are the major pressures on operational costs? Are they purely staff pay rises that are built into the system, or are there other pressures, forgetting for the moment about the local authority uncertainty that might affect them?
The main pressure that will affect the outcome of that projection is pay inflation. The expectation of a 2 per cent pay rise for police and support staff was factored into the demand side. Who knows what the actual awards will be? If they are less than that, that will clearly have an impact on the projected deficit.
I am sorry, convener, I should have asked this very small question. Why is the on-going deficit increasing from £7 million this year to £16 million to £18 million next year?
We expect wage inflation for police and support staff, as a pay increase is already agreed for next year and, for police officers, it is slightly ahead of any likely increase in funding. There is an inflationary pressure there that will not be met.
The Scottish Parliament information centre briefing indicates that the police grant is going up by 1.6 per cent in real terms, and that the other grants are going up by 0.9 per cent in real terms across the board. Does that feed through to Strathclyde?
Indeed, but we are looking at a 2.5 per cent pay rise for police officers. Given that 70 per cent of the budget goes on police officer staff items, there is an upward pressure that we do not expect will be met by increases in funding.
Although you did not say so specifically, the way you were talking earlier sounded as if there had been a reduction in the budget that had gone to the police authority. That is not the case; the budget has increased and, as Robert Brown indicated, in 2010-11, it will go up by 1.6 per cent in real terms. So it is not a budget cut that is causing you a problem, but the fact that the budget does not meet your expectations or the planning that you have put in place. Is that what has happened?
Indeed. Two basic scenarios were presented to the authority. The worst-case scenario saw no increase in absolute terms in funding levels, and the best-case scenario saw a marginal increase in funding. The true situation will be somewhere in between those scenarios.
The committee understands that Strathclyde police authority's budget working group will consider the funding gap in more detail, as we would expect. Has the group begun its work? What options does it have?
It has already met. As you identified, the report recommended that meetings should take place as soon as possible because we need to get down to business.
You raised the issue of the policing of parades, about which there has been a lot of publicity recently. Is there an opportunity for savings there? Also, can efficiency savings be made in relation to the policing of football grounds, given that you do not recover the full costs of that?
Those are two fairly non-contentious issues for the west of Scotland.
As there are no further questions, I thank you all for your attendance and for your evidence. We look forward with some trepidation to next year's meeting under the same heading. There will be a brief suspension.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
We continue evidence taking for our scrutiny of the draft budget. I welcome Ken Ross, Scottish secretary of the Fire Brigades Union; John Speed, member of the national committee of the Prison Officers Association; Calum Steele, general secretary of the Scottish Police Federation; and Dave Watson, senior policy officer with Unison. In the hope of saving us some time, I invite the witnesses to make very brief opening statements. We will thereafter proceed to questions.
I will start with police budgets, which were the focus of the previous evidence session. As always when looking at the Scottish Government's budget, there is—as has been made clear—confusion around the mix of central Government funding and local authority funding. We have concerns. The concept of a real-terms increase is based on a gross domestic product deflator of 1.5 per cent, but costs on police forces and other parts of the criminal justice budget are unlikely to be constrained within that figure. A particular concern with regard to the central Government budget is the potential cut in the SPSA's budget. The mix, and what the impact might be for the SPSA, is again not clear to us.
It would be useful if you could give us a copy of the paper to which you referred.
In the recent past, the Scottish Police Federation has commented on the financial situation at national level only in relatively small detail. Our national committee's line on the issue has not yet been determined, but we will assist the committee in any way that we can.
That is certainly a very pure stance.
As a representative of the Scottish national committee of the Prison Officers Association, I am here to represent our members in Scotland only.
That is why some of us felt constrained to comment on the issue.
We all appreciate that we need major investment if we are to have a 21st century Prison Service. We fully acknowledge that the service should be in the public sector.
Thank you. That was useful. It would be particularly helpful if you could let us have the document that you mentioned.
It was interesting to listen to the previous panel, because our colleagues in the police raised a lot of our concerns about future budgets. I will describe those concerns one at a time—they are detailed in our submission.
Thank you. We will now ask a series of questions that are directed at specific witnesses. If any of the other witnesses have a pressing need—I stress that it should be pressing—to contribute, please indicate that to me. Nigel Don will start with questions to the Scottish Police Federation.
Mr Steele, it is helpful that you were here to hear the previous panel. Will you reflect on what you have just heard and tell us whether you agree with the comments about the budget situation for the current year, which seemed be, "It's so-so—we'll get by," with a suggestion that in future years it will be a serious struggle?
I pretty much agree with the lion's share of the chief constables' comments. The future budgets will, ultimately, be a matter for politicians. I return to my opening comment that, if politicians genuinely view it to be their duty to ensure that the public are kept safe and secure, it is for them to put in place the funding to ensure that policing can provide the safety and security that the public demand.
I understand your point and agree with it absolutely. Do you accept that some of the politicians who need to be convinced are local ones and that we are entering a time when the funding of the police will become far more democratic, in the sense that it will depend on local politicians deciding that they want to spend local money on it?
There will always be challenges for local politicians. Indeed, the capacity of police boards and authorities to hold their respective forces and constabularies to account has been considered at length in the recent past—I think that I am correct to say that the committee considered that in a report that it produced last year or the year before. That question of balance will always exist. The historical difficulty is that genuine understanding and accountability have been lacking and it is a big ask to expect police authorities to move from what could be regarded as superficial scrutiny and understanding to holistic scrutiny and understanding in a short time and at short notice.
So you do not dispute the principle of my question but you worry about the processes and the understanding that local authorities have of the importance of policing.
No.
Sorry—you do not accept my statement in principle.
No. I—
Do you think that there should be ring-fenced funding for police?
Absolutely. It is essential. There is a long and varied history in relation to accountability and the management of money for the police services. In 1994, money was allocated to police forces on the basis of £1 for the traffic department, £1 for the drugs squad and £1 for the criminal investigation department; post-1994, that became, "Here's £3. Manage the police service as you see fit." That significant flexibility gave chief constables phenomenal autonomy to do what they wanted but, at the same time, it resulted in an element of distance between the capability to hold to account and the capability to scrutinise.
There is obviously a fundamental difference in there, which I recognise. Thank you for mentioning it.
The figures that I have show that there will be a £4.1 million reduction in the direct running costs of the Scottish Prison Service. The reality is that the SPS will try to take the vast majority of that from front-line staff. At some stage, somebody must say that enough is enough, because we need the staff to deal with the prisoners. We are either at that stage or close to it. However, because we have a partnership agreement with the Scottish Prison Service, we are committed to working with our management to try to find efficiency savings. We are doing that at the moment with the staff attendance arrangements review, but we will not make efficiencies for the hell of it because we must look after the health and safety of our members. If we do not think that the efficiencies can be made safely, we will have to say that they will not be made or must be looked for elsewhere.
It is important to stress that the £4.1 million cut is a cut not in the actual budget but in the plans that had been laid. The budget is actually up slightly in real terms.
I will press Mr Speed on the effect of a reduction in prisoner numbers. Am I right in thinking that, should such a thing ever happen—or should numbers at least stabilise—it would not make much difference to the cost of the Prison Service because the prison officers will still need to be there and the prisons will just be marginally less overcrowded? Is that too simple?
You are right. The other side of the coin is that it does not cost much more to work with the overcrowding that we have, so I suspect that you are right that there would be no savings to be made if prisoner numbers reduced.
Would any reduction in the number of prisoners have to be very substantial—I do not want to put a number on it, but substantial to the point at which we would be able to close a prison—before it made a significant difference to the Prison Service's running costs?
Yes. I have the figures for the prison population here. I would be amazed if you did not have that information, but the numbers are going up and are expected to continue to increase, alongside the reductions in staffing levels.
There has been some relief from overcrowding as new accommodation has come through, and in due course we will have the new prison at Low Moss as well. Does that provide any opportunities to make efficiency savings and release some of the pressures on prison officers? Perhaps there are some opportunities for savings in the prisons budget.
Low Moss will be a brand new prison, and we will need to find the staff from somewhere. It might cost the Scottish Prison Service money to staff the new jail because we have lost the staff from the old Low Moss to other establishments and through natural wastage. I suspect that we will need to recruit more staff for the new prison.
Will you share the figures with us? We have information on the number of prisoners, the capacity of our prisons and what is being used, but I do not think that we have figures on the number of prison staff.
I have a report that shows the reductions in prison staff and breaks the figures down to each prison and the banding of members of staff. That information covers 2000 to 2006, and I received the updated figures yesterday. I will provide you with that information before 22 October, and I will do my best to break it down according to individual prisons. I can give you the information now if you want, but—
If you could submit it in writing, that would be helpful, Mr Speed.
The convener might be fearful that another question would flow from that information, so it would be best if we could have it in writing.
Yes.
What is Unison's view of the Scottish Government's proposal to hold the grant for the criminal justice social work service at the current year's level not only for 2010-11 but for the following years as well?
As I indicated in my opening remarks, that is an area of concern for us. As always, we have to be careful because the budget that we are discussing is only the central budget that the Scottish Government allocates to the service and which pays for a number of central services as well as a contribution to services that are delivered locally. We must also consider the local authority funding in the mix.
Can you give a specific example, from your local experience, of the problem with the current position?
In essence, if we do not have the staff to do it, we cannot meet the 21-day standard. However, the biggest difference in the delivery of community sentences is probably qualitative rather than quantitative. The difference is that, if someone who delivers community sentences is pushed for time, they are essentially a community jailer—they do the basics, making sure that people are there and supervising them—while if there are proper staffing levels, they can do proper rehabilitation and work with offenders to identify their underlying problems.
In response to my colleague Paul Martin, you told us about the pressure that front-line workers will face in delivering criminal justice services in 2010-11, particularly given the changes that are coming—not to mention what will happen in future years. You know that we as a committee are charged with examining the overall justice budget and suggesting improvements to it. Do you see any scope for efficiency savings that could alleviate any of the pressure on the people at the coalface?
The Scottish local authorities have delivered on and exceeded the targets for efficiency savings in a variety of different ways, as I am sure you have heard from COSLA and others. The pressures on local authority budgets are, in general, not dissimilar to those that the chief constables on the previous witness panel described to the committee. There is a law of diminishing returns in operation: you can only make the big procurement changes once, although they produce some on-going savings.
I am not sure of the extent to which Unison represents people in the voluntary sector who work on criminal justice projects, but I believe that you do to some extent. What are the financial pressures on those services? I believe that they are funded centrally through section 10 funding and by local authority grants, and I get the impression that some of them are under as much pressure as the local authorities, if not more.
Absolutely. We represent members in that area, and it appears that a number of the more innovative services that the voluntary sector delivers are suffering from the same pressures. There has been a cut in funding, or funding has not been provided to meet additional costs, so a number of charities have had to call on their reserves or on voluntary funding to make up the shortfall in the funding that comes from the local authority and central Government. That concerns us as much as it would in relation to the statutory services.
Can you give us any detail on that, perhaps in a follow-up paper? Do you have any comprehensive information? I appreciate that detail is difficult to pin down because of the geographical spread of such things.
I cannot give you any hard numbers—my information comes from anecdotal feedback that we get from our representatives when they meet through our voluntary sector groups. There are individual examples, but I cannot give you a comprehensive view across the board. Part of the difficulty is that many of the freedom of information provisions do not apply to some of those services, which is something that we have been encouraging the Scottish Government to change.
Is non-statutory social work more likely to suffer than the more functional aspects that involve national objectives and standards? To pick up on Robert Brown's point, are local authorities likely to take a more protectionist view of their statutory services at the expense of the voluntary sector? Will they want to scrutinise or evaluate further the work that goes on in the voluntary sector?
Inevitably, a senior manager will focus more on delivering the statutory service, and the scrutiny that bodies such as Audit Scotland carry out tends to focus on those functions. However, our experience so far, and the feedback that I received at a meeting only a few weeks ago with a number of our members who work in the field, shows that there is not a particular bias with regard to cuts in the voluntary sector. Staff in local authorities reported similar issues, and one or two authorities thought that they might be able to provide the same services more cheaply by going to the voluntary sector. In fairness, therefore, it is far from what you suggest: the evidence to date—which admittedly is anecdotal—suggests that local authorities are looking to make savings on both the voluntary and statutory sides.
We now turn to Mr Ross. Paul Martin will ask the first question.
I am sure that the fire services are aware of the Government's proposed spending on the Scottish Fire Services College, firelink and the capital grant to local authorities. What impact do you think that that could have on front-line services?
My understanding is that that funding is completely separate and has come directly from the Scottish Government. That decision was made after the decision on the future of fire service control rooms and firelink. That programme is rolling out, and I believe that it is a three-stage programme, the second phase of which is under way. So far, it seems to be going to plan. The funding, which is a completely separate capital allocation, is vital because it will give us a digital radio system that allows us to keep in contact with the police and other blue-light services and improve our overall communication among ourselves and with different services.
Is there a concern that the removal of ring fencing could lead to horse trading? I think that it was you who used that term.
It was.
You mentioned that that process would intensify if the capital budget were part of that arrangement.
The committee should understand that, as well as covering the cost of fire stations, the capital budget covers the cost of fire appliances and other elements. It is massively important that fire authorities receive a proper level of capital funding, because fire engines get old: they are used quite a lot and have to be replaced relatively frequently. They cost a fair amount of money—I believe that one unit costs about £350,000 to £400,000—and, given that appliances are replaced on a rotational basis, the capital expenditure must be secured to cover those costs, as well as the other costs of keeping buildings maintained and fire stations up to date.
Thank you for your submission to the committee. On page 3, in the section on shared services, you list a range of services that could be shared to produce greater efficiency savings. I fully understand that desire, but as someone who has a background in Strathclyde fire brigade, as it was called when I worked for the organisation, I fail to understand whether any progress has been made on shared services, work on which got under way some years ago. Procurement stands out for me, as well as areas such as the purchase of equipment and uniforms. Has any progress been made over the past six, eight or 10 years, or have you raised concerns in your submission because there has been a failure to make progress?
There has been a degree of progress, but progress has not been made across all eight services. The issue was left for individual fire authorities to make progress on, which the Chief Fire Officers Association looked to direct. The problem is that different fire authorities are making different arrangements. For example, four fire authorities have agreed to carry out joint recruitment, but the other four do not want to be involved. There are other fire authorities that join up to purchase equipment, but the rest do not want to get involved. That results in a mixture of four authorities doing one thing, three doing another and one doing something else. The picture is disjointed.
I raised the question because, although the matter was discussed 10 years ago, progress seems somewhat slow. Perhaps we should pursue it.
When the Fire (Scotland) Act 2005 came in, it gave us additional legal responsibilities. Amazingly enough, prior to that fire services were responsible only for fire, even though we carried out other functions. The fire budget funded those other functions, and in 2005 we welcomed the fact that all the functions were recognised in statute—the three principle ones being fire, road traffic collisions and community fire safety.
That is why I asked about shared services—it seems that that area is still of some concern.
Absolutely.
Angela Constance has a couple of wind-up questions.
Having listened to Mr Ross this afternoon, I wonder whether the FBU has any concerns about how fire and rescue authorities spend their money. I offer a couple of Lothian and Borders examples. There are proposals to build a training centre in Newbridge, which is practically next door to the national training centre at Gullane. We also had a chief fire officer who retired, collected his pension and lump sum and was then reappointed as chief fire officer.
I will take the general point rather than the specific one. I thought that you might prefer that, convener.
Do you have a view on how joint boards could be more accountable? What should change?
I do not think that we have enough time today for me to go into that debate, but what I would say is that—
I think that we are entering the realms of opinion rather than evidence.
Briefly, there must be much more co-ordination across the eight boards. If they are not prepared to do that themselves, a third party might have to step in to ensure that they are co-ordinated.
Thank you for your briefing paper. The fire and rescue authorities should perhaps have a look at it: it might give them pointers about how they could find some of the efficiency savings that are needed.
Absolutely. Just to be clear, I echo the previous panel's view of the role of support staff, who are crucial in the fire service. Without them we obviously could not deliver the service to communities, but we must strike a balance. Uniformed personnel did support staff jobs in the past, but we were keen to see those jobs as non-uniformed positions and uniformed personnel redirected to the front line. However, while uniformed posts have been taken out of support departments and there has been a huge increase in the number of non-uniformed posts, that has not been reflected in an increased number of uniformed posts on the front line.
Gentlemen, I thank you very much for your attendance this morning. It has been exceptionally helpful. Mr Speed, if you could give us the documentation that is outstanding, that will complete the evidence from this panel.
Meeting closed at 13:21.