Official Report 399KB pdf
Item 2 is local policing. I ask the committee to try to conclude this item by 2.10 at the latest so that we have time to consider our work programme. We will try to keep an eye on the clock.
Good afternoon, panel.
I agree with virtually everything in the question. There is no doubt that the presence of a police station or police office and a front counter is part of an engagement policy and contact with the local community. There is no doubt about that at all.
If consultation had taken place at ward level, what you say would have been borne out, because people’s experience is that they generally use the telephone or, increasingly, social media to get in touch. That is why I feel that an opportunity has been lost. When you reflect on the consultation, do you think that it could have been handled better?
When we look back on things, we can always say that maybe we could have done them a little better, but I must defend my organisation and the staff who undertook the exercise. We have had allegations from a number of sources—people have made them to my face—including from front-counter staff that the first time that front-counter staff found out about what was happening was from a TV or radio report or when someone stopped them in the street. That is not credible.
I accept what you say about staff, but I think that the question was about the public at large—am I correct?
Yes—the question was also about the opportunity for engagement that could have arisen.
I apologise.
Apart from hearing that a big bad boy in Glasgow is closing everything, I am being sold the idea that—ironically—this is a good-news story, because across the former Northern Constabulary area hours are being extended. If something can be presented as a gain rather than elements that are lost, perhaps there will be a greater concentration on local communities. I am talking about the relationship with on-going work and the promotion—which I constantly do—of local policing plans, community councils’ connection with the bigger organisation and community beat officers’ involvement. I was talking more about that level than about staff.
I am happy to take responsibility for the fact that we might have gone on too negative an attack. I say that because we realised that people would be concerned; that was why we did a consultation. We could have said to every divisional commander in Scotland, without making a fuss, that they should change their local opening hours to what they thought seemed fit. Instead, we consulted the public.
Has that approach reinforced the idea that the decision is one that is made by someone in Glasgow rather than a decision that is made in a local community’s interests?
I guess that it has. I do not want to get too philosophical too early, but this is also about leadership. The development is important and, taken in the round, it is positive and goes in the right direction for Police Scotland, by ensuring that we offer a modern service. We wanted to present it as such and I wanted people to realise the direction that the organisation is going in. I accept what you say—that approach has possibly made people say, “It’s just this guy in Glasgow,” although I work not from Glasgow but from Stirling, as you well know.
I understand that.
The local policing plans are very much about the divisional commander engaging with local communities, community safety partnerships, community planning partnerships and so on to work out how the service will look for communities. The proposed plans were not developed in isolation by me and my team; they were produced in consultation with local command teams on the basis of existing interim plans and how we build towards the future.
I stress that this is a consultation process. In effect, it ends today, and we will reflect on the responses that we have received. I think that we have had about 17 internal proposals and, as you will know, we are required by legislation to look at alternative proposals from our staff. In the main, staff have responded in relation to their own individual situations. We will look at those responses and at the public responses that we have received—including letters from members and your MSP colleagues—and we will then reflect on what we are going to do.
Finally, on the proposal that there be a window, for argument’s sake, you said that closures are proposed for areas where the station would be retained. The downside of having a facility for the occasional caller—
Sorry, are you saying that we will keep a place open where it is very quiet?
It has been suggested to me that if a station remains, surely someone could just chap at the window and whoever is through the back would answer them.
Yes. I understand that. Again, policing is about dealing with society and humanity. If the locals know well enough that the cop is in there because they can see the car and they knock on the window, I imagine that the cop’s reaction will be to stick their head out the window and ask, “What do you want? What can we do for you?”
Margaret Mitchell and Graeme Pearson both want to come in on the issue of police front counters, so we will exhaust that area first.
Good afternoon, gentlemen. Can I press you a little bit on the consultation itself and on exactly how extensive it was and what methods were used to engage the public?
We did not engage external consultants to carry out a big, fancy process. We looked at the consultations, work and analysis that had already been done in a number of the eight legacy forces. Where such work had not been done—in four forces, I think—
Yes, in four forces.
In the four legacy forces where that had not been done, we commissioned some up-to-date work. However, I do not want people to get carried away about the work that we did. In the main, the work involved the front-counter staff making a note of how many people came in. We took that approach rather than entertain the notion of paying for somebody from outside to come in and do that work. We wanted the staff to do the work, so the figures are what they have generated—
I will just stop you there, chief constable. I think that you are talking about the review; I am asking about how widespread the public consultation was.
Again, we are still in that consultation process because it has not—
It closes today.
Yes, it closes today.
So how has Police Scotland engaged with the public in the consultation?
As you suggested, we got a certain amount of newspaper and media coverage. I have done a large number of media interviews about the consultation, and we have covered most of the national newspapers. People have a website and an address that they can send emails to. You will be aware that at least one regional newspaper has run a campaign—quite a few emails came in as a result of that. We have also received letters from people.
The police service is a public service that is undertaking a very important consultation. If the Parliament has a consultation, we ensure that it is as wide ranging and inclusive as possible. Was an equality impact assessment done of the consultation?
Yes, there certainly was.
How was that done?
Could I also explain what we have done?
Yes, certainly.
On 27 June, we wrote to every elected member in Scotland and every community council in Scotland, as well as a number of stakeholder groups, including minority groups. When we launched the formal consultation on 1 October, we repeated that exercise. Every divisional commander wrote to every stakeholder in their division—the people they know and work with regularly. They looked at who represents the communities that they serve. We wrote to them on 1 October, inviting comment, sending them a pack, which dictates what we are proposing, and directing them to the website that the chief constable mentioned. The website gives full details of the proposals across Scotland. In the 300 or so wards across Scotland, every elected member, every community council and everyone who is a representative of the communities that we serve has been sent a personalised email or letter.
There seems to have been a big concentration on electronic communication, which many elderly people do not have access to. Where is the communication with deaf people, blind people and people from different backgrounds who speak different languages? My understanding of a proper equality impact assessment and a very thorough consultation is that it is ensured that everyone’s views are taken into account.
I accept some of that, but I do not think that anyone who reads newspapers, listens to the radio or listens to or watches television could have missed the fact that the consultation is on-going, and that the consultation process is available. We have had letters from people, so we have not just received email responses. I have had letters from MSPs who have been contacted by a number of their constituents and who have wanted to express their views. My view is that it has been a fairly widespread consultation, and we have certainly had responses from the public on it.
How many have you had to date?
I do not have exact figures, and the number changes daily—
Obviously, but I wondered whether you had a fairly up-to-date—
I am looking at the numbers of responses, and we have had 51 from elected members, two from local authorities, four from community councils, and 69 from members of the public.
That was as at Friday last week.
I would not say that 69 is a resounding figure, but I do not think that that is because the public do not care. I again ask Police Scotland to look at the consultation.
With respect, I do not think that anybody can impute anything. You can impute that the measures were not properly consulted on, but I do not think that you can impute why people have not responded, which is a matter for conjecture. It is fair to go along the line of saying that the consultation was not wide enough, but I do not think that it would be quite fair to say—
I think that it would be worth casting another eye over it.
I am afraid that we just do not see eye to eye on this subject. Where a counter is busy and used a lot, it stays open—that is the whole thrust behind maintaining front-line services. Indeed, where a counter is very busy, we will extend the opening hours. By front-line services, we also mean police officers being available to the public in uniform, on patrol and able to respond to their issues—to go round to people’s houses when they call 101 and say, “I want to see a cop”; when that happens, we send police officers round to see them.
I will make a final point. Although I welcome all those things and I agree that you are being proactive, there is an opportunity to do that with police counters. As you well know, when people call 101 and ask for a police officer to be sent, whether that happens depends very much on other policing pressures at the time, whereas a person can go within dedicated times to the police counter and they will know that they can see someone face to face. They are then in control. That control is being taken away, despite all the welcome and proactive things that you are suggesting. I only ask you to reflect on that.
To be frank, I have had not one email about the closure of counters, despite the fact that I convene this committee and have put out press on the issue and asked people to get in touch with me. If you have received something directly from my constituents, I would be pleased to know about that, because nobody came to me.
That is not uncommon and it is not a particularly new initiative—it has lasted for a number of years because it works. If somebody contacts the police—increasingly, that happens through the 101 line, with 55 per cent of our non-emergency calls now coming in that way—and says that they would like to see a police officer, the person on the other end will establish whether the call is urgent and, if the answer is no, rather than say that a police officer will come to see them whenever possible, take a rather more intelligent and citizen-focused approach and ask, “When would suit you?” Often, the person will say that they are at work or have to pick up people from school, so it would be better if it was after 6 o’clock at night, and we then tabulate that. A car is set aside with one or possibly two people in it—often, we just use one person because the issues are non-contentious and non-evidential—and they will create a diary of appointments for the day and go and see the members of the public. Because the issues are not urgent, we can do that at a time that suits the people and, more often than not, a time that suits us, too, if it is not a peak period. We will often use officers who know the area particularly well and can therefore provide a particularly bespoke service.
One reason why people go to police stations is lost property. If someone has lost their dog, handbag or wallet, they are liable to phone or go to the police station to ask if anybody has handed it in. What will happen to that service? That is perhaps one reason why we need our police counters.
It can be a reason, but there is no reason why people cannot report lost property over the phone. People do not have to go into the station, although if they know the opening hours of the local—
No, but where do people hand in lost property? They would usually hand it in to the police counter.
Yes, they would.
That is what they would think of doing. Maybe if they found something in a supermarket, they would hand it in there, but if it is on the street or whatever, they would hand it in to the police station. What will happen with that?
That is true and that is one of the issues that will be reflected in the footfall. If that happens a lot at a police station, the footfall will be relatively high and therefore I would expect that the place would not be closed down and might even have its opening hours extended. It goes back to the volume of people. For a small station in a place with relatively low footfall, lost property being handed in will be a very rare event.
I am not suggesting that a counter should be kept open just for that, but what will happen? Where will people hand in lost property?
If property is found and someone has taken it home, which is often the case, there is no reason why they cannot phone 101 and, at some point, the diary car will come and pick it up.
I just thought that I would mention it because the issue had been raised with me in a surgery.
At the outset, when I was conversing with Mr Naylor, I indicated that the business case might well justify some offices closing or amending their hours. My position is not that there should be no closures, but that we will be led by public opinion and an assessment of the case that is put forward.
Let me respond to the numbers that you are talking about. I am not terribly surprised that on the issue of whether the public want to keep front counters open, 95 per cent of respondents are saying, “I want more and I oppose cuts.” It is human nature and it is completely understandable: if people are asked whether they want more or less of something, they will say that they want more of it.
I did not pose the question, but I think that it was, “Do you agree with the closure of your local police office?”, not, “Do you want more or less?”
I am surprised that it was not 100 per cent then.
I presume that some members of the public have not had quite the same engagement with the police as others and would be keen to see the office close—[Laughter].
I could not possibly comment on that. I cannot believe that to be the case, but your question deserves a serious answer. I will turn to Craig Naylor, who has been far more involved, as you know, because you have spoken with him.
It is a really interesting piece of work, which I saw briefly before I came here. I understand that the question was, “Would you like the police station to remain open or not?” The police station is remaining open, and is remaining open seven days a week, so the question is not quite accurate with regard to our proposals. To be honest, also the people of Portobello are getting to keep the police station open. It will be open for shortened hours, but it is staying open. We are meeting the demands that have been made of us in that regard.
The more pressing question is about the means of obtaining public opinion, given the fairly substantial changes that you have proposed. There is no structured means by which a member of the public can come back to you. They might be able to guess their way through, but there is nothing that gives them an address to post a response to, for example.
I disagree with your point, Mr Pearson. We have been very vocal in the press. Chief Constable House, Assistant Chief Constable Mawson, who has been leading the project, and I have been in the press considerably over the past month. We also have a dedicated website with a very clear and transparent set of proposals for each territorial division and letters have come in to each divisional command team, so people are making their preferences known to us through traditional and more modern methods. The idea that there is no formal or structured method is not quite accurate.
There is no formal or structured means of doing it, but there are other avenues through which to make your opinion known, if you know how the system works. However, there is not a chapter in the process that is for the public. You have spoken to elected members and other partner agencies, but there is no direct approach to the public, telling them about how individual citizens can make their opinions known.
That sounds a very sensible proposal, but I must stress again that we are in a period of consultation. I accept that some members feel that the consultation was not as widespread for the public as it could have been, but that is not how it feels to me. We cannot open a newspaper or listen to a news item without seeing or hearing something about it. There are vox pops coming out of our ears in relation to the issue.
Is that not more of a response to the fact that there was a bit of a blundered announcement of the consultation that meant that the press put its foot on the accelerator and presented it as police stations closing? I think that what the committee is getting at is that you should have been in control of it and done it in a more measured fashion over a longer period—that is the thrust from members—rather than people finding out about the proposals in the paper or on the radio. That happened because the consultation had not been started properly, which is the committee’s position.
I am sorry, but I do not really accept that. We have talked to the media about it and have tried to expand the coverage ourselves. I do not think that we are trying to play catch-up from that point of view. We are very happy to talk about it and we keep stressing that it is a consultation phase.
I have one more point.
We will move on to another topic after this.
I do not seek to labour the point, but will the chief constable consider allowing members of the public to make their opinions known after 1 November so that they can be taken into account?
Of course. I am happy to say that because we are not pressing the button on some decision tomorrow; we will be looking at the matter over the next four to six weeks and will go back and discuss it with stakeholders. It is difficult to say, “Here are the alternatives,” when we are also in consultation with partners to establish what the alternatives are. We could not always put that out to people, but most of the media articles that we have covered have said, “We’re looking at alternatives such as—”. I know that I have covered that every time that I have spoken to people about the matter. So, we will be open to it if people want to respond.
In the public consciousness, the consultation finishes today, but you will accept comments over the next month.
Yes, we will accept late entries.
Thanks for that.
I am sure that this event itself will spur more people to respond, which will be great.
I think that it might.
I do not know how much the public tune into meetings of the sub-committee.
Thank you, convener. Like you, I have not had one complaint about police counters. However, we have heard from colleagues today quite a lot about communication. Colleagues around the table obviously think that there has been a failure in that regard, but I want to stress some of the positive aspects of communication that some of us were a bit worried about when we moved to having the single force.
I whole-heartedly agree. That is why, at a recent meeting of the 14 divisional commanders, I highlighted the coverage that the Aberdeen city division gets in its newspapers. They do something called “On the beat”, which involves a local inspector or chief inspector going into the local newspaper to provide half a page, not on earth-shattering, high-level crime issues but on the stuff that people are concerned about. It is highly effective, so I asked the other divisional commanders if I could see their media plans mirroring what is going on in Aberdeen city, which has a particularly effective impact. I get cuttings from most of the regional newspapers on a daily basis, and that example stands out.
I am sure that it is quite useful for the frontline bobbies who are trying to resolve issues in the communities that they are patrolling.
Yes.
I turn to the perceived standardisation of certain things about which concern has been expressed in my patch, particularly in relation to stop and search. In my 14 years as an elected politician, I never had any complaints about stop and search, and I should say that for 13 of those years I was also on a police board. Now, however, I am beginning to get complaints about stop and search from members of the public who think that what is being done is unreasonable. Could I have an assurance that there is no standardisation, with the procedure from elsewhere in the country being exported to other parts where it has not been the norm in the past?
I understand your point about standardisation, but just 30 seconds ago I finished making my point about wanting to standardise the way in which we deal with the media based on the Aberdeen example. There is sometimes a thin line between standardisation and best practice. That is my first point.
Indeed.
Secondly, you have already identified the fact that violent crime in Aberdeen is down 13 per cent. In fact, violent crime across the country is down 13 per cent. There has been an increase in stop and search usage across the country. In some places, it has been a marked increase and in others it has been a relatively modest increase.
We are pushed for time, but I am glad to hear you say that there are no targets. What would you do—this is only semi-hypothetical—
My goodness. We will tell you if that is true.
It is partly based in fact. What would you do if someone who had no criminal record was searched four times in a very short period of time, and not always in the city centre? What would you do then?
I would expect that, locally, management would be keeping an eye on the number of people who were being stopped and searched, but the fact that someone does not have a criminal record does not mean that they do not have an intelligence record.
I understand that.
For me, the trigger would be the other way round. The analysis would have to show not that the individual had been stopped four times, but that they had been stopped by the same officer. If the same officer had stopped them four times, that would beg an explanation. If the individual had been stopped by four different officers, I would want to understand why that was. If you would like to let us have the details of the cases in question, we could have a look at them.
Thank you.
This is not pejorative—you will have heard it before—but I would like to ask you about the concerns that were expressed when you took over as chief constable that we would have Strathclyde policing writ large. There was perhaps no bigger example of that perceived fear than the sauna saga in Edinburgh. It appears that, over the years, Lothian and Borders Police had a different culture and attitude to containing, controlling and managing the sex trade in Edinburgh from that which was adopted in the west of Scotland. It seems to me and to others that the recent decisions by the City of Edinburgh Council’s licensing committee were an example of a whole culture change that came out of the blue, which seemed to be the result of a west of Scotland approach coming to Edinburgh, trampling on the management of the issue and not succeeding against the council.
I would, and I thank the convener for asking the question because I want to take on that issue.
No. I put the issue to you as a challenge that is out there and which the public would want me to ask you about.
Exactly. There is a myth that Lothian and Borders Police, in somehow colluding with the council’s sauna policy, did not bother carrying out licensing inspections. That is clearly untrue.
The issue was not that the police did not carry out licensing inspections; rather, it was that what the police consider inappropriate in those premises has changed.
I do not agree. I have the dates of every inspection that was carried out. On 28 and 29 October 2009, 56 female workers were interviewed and one male, whom I will not name, was reported to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service for brothel-keeping charges. That was in 2009, not 2013. In January 2010, 45 women were interviewed, and 53 further women were interviewed later on. A female was charged with possession of extreme pornography and a successful application was made for the suspension of that sauna’s licence, which happened in 2011. Lothian and Borders Police therefore had a history of interventions and reporting to the licensing committee.
I hear what you are saying about keeping people safe, but some people might argue that, in endeavouring to remove contraceptives from saunas and to close down the saunas, the police are making certain people in Edinburgh more unsafe. I cannot recall in my time the police objecting, on the lines that they have objected recently, to the well-known operations of saunas in Edinburgh. There is not just a perception that things have changed: the objections have changed.
I challenge the convener on her use of the word “objected”. We do not object to the saunas. We carry out—
No.
I am sorry, but you used the word.
You object to what saunas are actually doing; “saunas” is a euphemism for “brothels” in some respects.
I do not object to it at all; neither does Police Scotland. We carry out licensing visits and we report what we find. In the case that we are talking about, we reported what we found to the Crown Office because the 18 warrants that we executed in that operation were issued by the Crown Office. Those warrants were obtained by the Crown Office—not by us—to examine and investigate criminal behaviour. Let me again stress that the operation was conceived of and run by the division in Edinburgh.
Yes.
The Edinburgh divisional commander has worked all his service as a Lothian and Borders officer, as have the majority of his command team. The reality is that a preponderance of my command team at chief officer level is the legacy of the Lothian and Borders Police, so I do not think that the characterisation of the police force—it is not yours alone—is entirely fair. Strathclyde Police did some things particularly well that we are exporting to the rest of Scotland; there are also things that Grampian Police and Lothian and Borders Police did well—the same applies all across the country.
I am not necessarily giving my personal views; rather, I am putting views that the public would expect the committee to put to you and challenge you on. I take it from what you have said that there has been no change in the cultural attitude of local policing in Edinburgh towards saunas or what are in some respects, but not all, brothels. Is that correct?
There has been nothing in what I, or Police Scotland, am responsible for. I do not believe that there has been a change in the cultural approach to that.
Okay. That could not be clearer. That is fine.
Yes, if I may. My question is for Mr Graham, who has sat patiently throughout the meeting.
Good afternoon. I have been sitting here patiently, but I know that the chief constable, Sir Stephen House, has an awful lot more interesting things to say than I have.
Not at all. You must not say that.
I am quite happy to sit here quietly.
We Grahames do not say that.
Thank you, convener. I should always remember that.
Yes. It is in the very nature of a committee such as this one that we dwell on the negatives and not necessarily on the things that are going well. It is important that that is recounted.
Indeed.
Will you comment on the system of devolved resource management, which was different in each of the legacy forces, and the extent to which that would reinforce the local element? It is accepted that there is a transitional period, so that cannot happen immediately. Accountability and scrutiny come with resources, of course. Will you pick up on that in your inspections?
I would be surprised if that were not picked up, although we would be interested in the impact of the national organisation on the delivery of services at the local level.
Finally, will you have a media strategy associated with the inspection regime?
I would endeavour to do my best with that.
Speak to Aberdeen.
Politicians are always very careful about the media strategy, as we are very careful with the media ourselves.
Happily my question is along much the same lines as Mr Finnie’s. I would like Her Majesty’s inspector of constabulary for Scotland not to report to the committee today, but to write to us to give an indication of the kind of inspections that he intends to conduct over the next 12 months and the kind of work that he will engage in. Will he measure, first, how well Police Scotland is protecting and improving local services and, secondly, how it is strengthening the connection between services and communities? Will those two principles become the benchmarks against which he will conduct the inspections?
Can I ask for that information to be provided in writing to the committee?
That is what I said.
We will write out to Mr Graham, rather than him having to note down the question—it will also be in the Official Report.
On Tuesday, chief constable, I asked you the hypothetical question whether, if local authorities were to withdraw their funding for the 320 extra police that they provide in Scotland, you had contingency plans. The question was hypothetical then, but have you reviewed the matter or changed your opinion given the suggestion of the withdrawal of funding by the City of Edinburgh Council? How will that affect the ability to maintain the extra 1,000 police officers to which Police Scotland is committed?
I know that time is short, but let me understand your question. As far as I am concerned, it is still a hypothetical question—unless you know something that I do not.
I think that the City of Edinburgh Council has suggested that it was going to withdraw some of its funding. Others may follow, because—as I understand it—they may find that the additional funding that they provide is not really giving them the influence that they had hoped for over where the officers are deployed.
I am sorry, but we knew this when I was at the Justice Committee on Tuesday; I thought that I had gone into the issue then.
I am sorry, but we must stop there. We can return to the matter and there are obviously many other issues that we have not raised, such as control rooms and traffic wardens—some people think that it is a bad thing that they are going and others think that it is a good thing. We may have to return to lots of other issues, but we must finish before the Parliament resumes at 2:30.