The next item of business is a debate on motion S4M-05899, in the name of Alison McInnes, on police centralisation. I invite members who wish to speak to press their request-to-speak buttons and indicate at this stage that the debate is extremely tight for time.
I call Alison McInnes to speak to and move the motion. Ms McInnes, you have a very tight 10 minutes.
14:40
At last Thursday’s First Minister’s question time, Alex Salmond asked me why we had not returned to the subject of police reform the week after we had first asked him about it in January. Sadly—and I know that members on all sides are as unhappy about this as we are—the Liberal Democrats get only one day of debating time a year. That day is today and we would not want to disappoint the First Minister again.
I want to start by taking the Cabinet Secretary for Justice’s mind back to the first day of stage 2 of the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Bill. He might recall rejecting one of my amendments; actually, he rejected them all, but when he rejected this one in particular he said:
“It would let ministers off the hook ... as ministers could not be held to account”.—[Official Report, Justice Committee, 29 May 2012; c 1350.]
Given what has since unfolded, we will be only too happy to hold him to account for his decisions.
Members on all sides know the Liberal Democrats’ position on the single police force: we were not in favour of the principle, the detail or the reality. However, we are where we are and I have no intention of standing here and trying to argue that we can put the genie back in the bottle. Now we join with all sides in wanting to ensure that the new police force works.
During the bill’s passage, members from all sides of this chamber raised genuine concerns and all parties lodged positive and constructive amendments. We know that the Government has its majority and that we cannot make it listen to reasoned opposition, but the fact that it chose to wilfully ignore such opposition reflects poorly on it. Such an attitude ill befits a Parliament that is meant to be reflective of the Scottish people.
As we have all seen, since the appointment of the members of the Scottish Police Authority and the new chief constable at the tail-end of last year, an on-going dispute has been played out in the media that the Government has been curiously hesitant to step into. Back in November, the First Minister told Willie Rennie that there were “creative tensions” between Vic Emery and Stephen House and, in December, Kenny MacAskill told the chamber that discussions between Mr House and Mr Emery had been “fruitful and progressive”. Imagine our surprise to find out that the Government had brought in the Lord Advocate to back up its view on how the legislation should be read; that, in January, one of the cabinet secretary’s senior civil servants wrote to Vic Emery to tell him that the Government was
“of the view that the proposed arrangement is unbalanced, confusing and would place the Police Service of Scotland in a unique and invidious position”
and that Vic Emery responded by saying that
“the Board’s reservoir of patience with the protracted nature of resolving this kind of issue is already running low.”
My colleagues on the Justice Committee will know the feeling. I think that we will all agree that our dealings so far with the SPA have been frustrating.
I admit that the Government is in an interesting dilemma. By stepping in, it will have to admit that there are shortcomings in the legislation; however, it will at least be able to make the changes needed to ensure that the SPA has a clear and defined role. Alternatively, if it keeps on defending its law, it will have to watch as the SPA’s self-determined remit threatens the effectiveness of the single police force before it even starts policing. Perhaps we should be relieved that the Government has stepped in to at least try to get the SPA back on track, even if it looks like being too little, too late.
At the heart of the problem is the democratic vacuum that has been created within our police service. In three weeks’ time, the Government will turn its back on a system in which locally elected members appoint police chiefs, scrutinise police actions and manage police budgets. Instead, all those things will be done by the SPA, which is an unelected board appointed on the say-so of the Scottish ministers. Even if members think that that is acceptable—and l, for one, do not—surely we can all agree that the SPA’s responsibilities should be so fully defined in law that there can be no confusion over how its relationship with the police service works.
The Government has handed the 13 people on that authority a £1 billion budget and oversight of Scotland’s entire police service. We must ask: “Who watches the watchmen?” As it is, the Parliament has been circumvented. We had no role in appointing the SPA; we are confined in how we can scrutinise it and the new police force; and we were ignored in strengthening the law. So much for democracy within the new police service. All the power is in the hands of the cabinet secretary, and it is up to him to find a long-term solution.
The three aspects that we highlighted in our motion are staffing, human resources and budgeting, but we could have listed more. In each and every one of them, the problem is the same. The SPA has interpreted the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 in a way that will give it direct, hands-on control over fundamental aspects of our police service. What started as a disagreement over human resources has snowballed out of control. It was clear to all—or to nearly everyone, apart from the SPA—that the planned approach on that was simply not fit for purpose. It was not in keeping with the intention of the act, even if, thanks to the Government’s legislative complacency, it was within the legal interpretation. Had the Government stepped in early to clarify matters, that might have been the end of the disagreements but, instead, it stood idly by and the Parliament, bereft of input, was forced to do likewise.
We now know that the Government did not agree with the SPA’s interpretation. We also know that, when it advertised the chief constable’s position, it stated that he would have
“direction and control over 17,000 officers and 6,500 police staff”.
So when the authority was allowed to get its own way—mostly—on human resources, it decided to flex its muscles and to test where else it could expand its remit. Even where agreement has been reached, it seems clear that Mr Emery has not really changed his views. He has compromised so that things can progress, and I do not doubt that the SPA will return to the matter.
All that has led us to the situation in which an experienced authority member feels that it could rightly be their role to question decisions that the police make on how they carry out active criminal investigations. Whatever the Government’s vision of the future of Scotland’s policing was, surely it was not that. We must be very concerned about what other aspects of policing the SPA might try to take an active role in in the future.
In the Justice Committee, members from all parties agree that it is imperative for the Parliament to take a more proactive role in scrutinising the new police service and the SPA. Indeed, later this afternoon, the Parliament will be asked to approve the establishment of a sub-committee on policing. I understand that that will be the first time that we have ever set up a sub-committee in the Parliament. That demonstrates the importance that the Justice Committee places on the matter. The six members of that sub-committee will be tasked with providing the same democratic oversight that was previously carried out by dozens of police board members from around Scotland, if they possibly can. The sub-committee will also be tasked with monitoring the SPA. However, it is in the Government’s hands alone to curb the SPA when it overreaches itself.
We should be under no illusions. The changes that were voted through in the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 represent the biggest shake-up of policing in Scotland for a generation and mistakes will inevitably have been made. That is the case in almost any piece of legislation that runs to 130 pages, but it will be all the more so when Opposition concerns are so directly ignored. The act’s shortcomings are there for all to see. They have been played out in newspapers, on television, in committee meetings and, unfortunately, behind quickly closed doors.
The Scottish Police Authority has an important job to do, and the police service of Scotland has many vital roles to play in keeping our communities safe, but right now, the Government has the most important responsibility. It must ensure that the police set-up that it is creating is fit for purpose and that Scotland’s new police service is not constrained in being the police service that the people of Scotland deserve.
I do not believe that the Government intended ambiguous legislation and I would be happy to work constructively with it to make the legislation better. I therefore ask it to hold up its hands and say that it will look at the legislation again.
I am deeply disappointed that the Government’s amendment indicates that it thinks that everything is just hunky-dory. That is just burying its head in the sand. It needs to tighten up the legislation and get the show back on track.
I urge the Government to review urgently the scope of the Scottish Police Authority to ensure that it does exactly what was intended, and to ensure that Scotland’s new police force is able to get on with its important work.
I move,
That the Parliament notes with concern the ongoing uncertainties surrounding the Police Service of Scotland ahead of its taking over all police functions on 1 April 2013; believes that, by taking control of policing out of the hands of locally elected members and transferring it to a board appointed by the Scottish Ministers, the Scottish Government has created a democratic deficit in Scotland’s police service; further believes that the Scottish Government’s complacent attitude toward its reform programme has allowed the Scottish Police Authority to effectively redefine the scope of its own remit; considers that decisions taken by the Scottish Police Authority on staffing, human resources and budgeting could put at risk the future operational effectiveness of policing in Scotland, and calls on the Scottish Government to review as a matter of urgency whether the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 should be amended to provide clarity as to the rightful functions and responsibilities of the Scottish Police Authority and to report back to the Parliament before the end of June 2013.
I call Kenny MacAskill to speak to and move amendment S4M-05899.3. The cabinet secretary has seven minutes.
14:49
I welcome the opportunity to respond to Alison McInnes and the Liberal Democrat motion.
I am sure that all members recognise that Scottish policing is performing excellently. Crime is at a 37-year low.
Can the cabinet secretary confirm that the number of offences rose last year by 3 per cent, or 14,000 cases, and that the only reason that he can claim that crime is at a 37-year low is that the Scottish Government omitted offences, including some serious crimes and assaults, from the headline figure, despite having in every previous year combined offences and crimes?
We operate on the same basis that was handed down to us by our predecessors. The statistics are there and the 37-year low is something that communities the length and breadth of Scotland welcome. The number of crimes involving handling an offensive weapon is now at its lowest in 18 years. Public confidence is high and rising, and the people of Scotland feel safer in their communities. That situation is supported by the more than 1,000 extra officers that we have delivered in communities since 2007. Reform and the new police service of Scotland will safeguard those hard-won gains and protect policing from Westminster cuts.
Can the cabinet secretary confirm that all those 1,000 extra police officers are, as he says, on the streets and not in police stations?
As I keep saying, those are operational matters for the chief constable. However, he has made it quite clear in evidence to the Parliament and elsewhere that it is his job to ensure that officers are doing what they are paid to do, preferably in their communities. We have yet to see evidence of backfilling from the chief constable or, indeed, from Her Majesty’s chief inspector of constabulary for Scotland.
Let us contrast the situation here with that in England and Wales.
Will the cabinet secretary give way?
In a minute.
Officer numbers in England and Wales are at their lowest for 11 years, the terms and conditions of those who serve are being attacked and morale is at rock bottom. In addition, around £100 million was wasted on elections for police commissioners, which was enough to pay for 3,000 officers. I will give way to Mr Rennie, if he wants to justify that.
I am sure that the cabinet secretary was going to say that crime in England and Wales is at its lowest level since records began. I am sure that that was going to be part of his next bit of script. However, since he is so admiring of the chief constable, will he agree to his call for fresh legislation?
The chief constable does not want fresh legislation. I have been speaking to the chief constable regularly and it is quite clear that he is not asking for fresh legislation; he is asking us to work towards 1 April, which is what he is putting his efforts towards. I commend him and, indeed, Vic Emery for that. I am glad to see that Mr Rennie did not seek to dispute any of the figures relating to the collapse of policing south of the border. This Government will not let any of that happen here.
We are less than three weeks away from the new police service of Scotland going live. Strong progress has been made and the Scottish Police Authority and the police service are working closely together to ensure a smooth transition.
The people of Scotland are understandably proud of community policing and value it, as does this Government. Local policing will remain at the heart of the new service. There is no so-called democratic deficit and there will be new local arrangements that will give more elected members than ever before the chance to have their say on policing in their area. A local commander for each area will work with the council and partners to shape policing in that area. For the first time ever, there will be a local policing plan for every council ward in Scotland. The SPA will, of course, also provide enhanced levels of scrutiny.
Reform will also strengthen national policing. For the first time ever, all communities in Scotland will have access to specialist expertise and equipment whenever and wherever it is needed. We have already seen the fruits of that approach. Just last week, I helped to launch the new specialist crime division here in Edinburgh, which is co-ordinated nationally and delivered locally. It will lead the fight against crime, with more than 2,000 detectives and staff working closely together. We have also seen the launch of the new national trunk roads patrol unit and the 101 single non-emergency number. In addition, we published this morning the strategic policing priorities, which set the high-level outcomes that the SPA and the service will work together to deliver.
The list of achievements ahead of day 1 goes on, underlining the remarkable progress that has been made since the Parliament approved the legislation last summer. None of that progress has been impeded by the discussions between the SPA and the police service on corporate functions. Our legislation, which was overwhelmingly approved by the Scottish Parliament after being scrutinised by four committees, clearly sets out the roles and responsibilities of the chair and the chief. The 2012 act is clear that the chief constable, although accountable to the SPA, has direction and control of the police service, including constables and police staff.
High-level agreement on corporate functions was reached at the SPA board meeting on 18 January. There was further dialogue on the detail and staff designations were agreed at the SPA board meeting last Friday. I am sure that all members will join me in welcoming that agreement.
The Government has been fully engaged on the issue from the outset. SPA chair Vic Emery and Chief Constable Stephen House, and the SPA and the police service of Scotland, continue to work closely together as we approach day 1. There will be no millennium moment at midnight on 1 April. The police will continue to provide the same excellent service across Scotland as they are providing today and have provided day in, day out.
Strong progress continues to be made. I reject the Liberal Democrat motion and the Labour and Conservative amendments. We have an outstanding police service in Scotland. We require to reform, to ensure that we can deal with the huge cuts that are coming from Westminster and avoid the catastrophe that is playing out south of the border.
I move amendment S4M-05899.3, to leave out from “notes” to end and insert:
“welcomes the 1,000 extra officers that the Scottish Government has delivered in communities since 2007, leading to crime at a 37-year low; agrees that the new Police Service of Scotland will safeguard policing from UK Government cuts; notes that the national governance provided by the Scottish Police Authority will be complemented by new local arrangements, providing the opportunity for more locally elected members than ever before to have their say; further agrees that the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012, as overwhelmingly approved by the Parliament, clearly sets out the roles and responsibilities of the Scottish Police Authority and Police Service of Scotland; further welcomes the agreement reached on corporate functions and staff designations and the ongoing joint working to ensure a smooth transition to commencement on 1 April 2013, and recognises that good progress has been made already, including the establishment of the Specialist Crime Division and the new national Trunk Roads Patrol Unit.”
14:56
Another debate on policing, and another Scottish Government speech—and amendment—of breathtaking complacency.
In December, Kenny MacAskill told us that the turf war would be over by Christmas. As we heard, Alex Salmond described the relationship between Stephen House and Vic Emery as one of creative tension. Some creative tension: a chief constable has had to argue for the right to make his own decisions about police staff and budgets, and a cabinet secretary has had to call in the Lord Advocate to tell the chairman of the board how to interpret the law.
Kenny MacAskill is responsible for the 2012 act. He might want to hide from that responsibility, as if all members of the Scottish Parliament share in his failure as minister in charge of the legislation. However, if a minister brings in a law that is seriously flawed or subject to serious misinterpretation by those who are charged with its implementation, it is surely that minister’s job to take ownership of the problem and sort it out. If the problem has arisen following appointments that the same minister made, the responsibility is all the greater.
Just as Kenny MacAskill has rejected the motion and the amendments from parties other than his party, he rejected amendment after amendment to the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Bill that sought to improve the transparency, accountability and effective governance of the new police service. It was he who made the ministerial appointments in question, too.
The cabinet secretary has refused again and again—he did so a moment ago—to acknowledge the high price that will be paid by police staff for his approach to reform and the impact that that will have on the service as a whole. He claims that his policies will
“safeguard policing from UK Government cuts”.
That is because he is desperate to talk about anyone else’s cuts but his own. However, it is the Scottish Government cuts to policing for which he is accountable. Those cuts go far beyond savings that are made from reducing duplication—we are talking about £60 million in the coming financial year, another £60 million in the next financial year and a further £60 million in the year after that. No wonder the chief constable has said, time and again, on the record, that he cannot deliver those cuts year on year without reducing the number of police officers in year 3.
Yvette Cooper criticises the reduction in police officers south of the border and suggests that Labour would cut the number in England and Wales by only 10,000. How many police officers does Mr Macdonald suggest that Labour would cut in Scotland?
I suggest that Kenny MacAskill answers the questions that are asked of him as minister with responsibility for the area, rather than engaging in puerile attempts to divert the debate to something that is happening elsewhere in the United Kingdom.
The cabinet secretary claims that he has seen no evidence of the backfilling of staff jobs. It is a shame that he was not able to attend the meeting that took place here last week to launch Unison’s updated report on civilianisation in the Scottish police service. If he had attended the meeting, he would not stand up in the chamber and claim to have protected policing in Scotland against cuts. Twenty MSPs, from all parties, attended the event and heard directly from police staff about the threats that they face and the backfilling of staff posts by police officers, which is already under way.
There were staff at that meeting from every part of Scotland and from all eight existing forces, and they all had similar tales to tell. A custody officer from Central Scotland Police said that police staff are in limbo because they do not know who their employer will be in a few weeks’ time, where they will be working or even whether they will have a job. A worker from Lothian and Borders Police said that staff are working through sickness. A colleague from Northern Constabulary said that staff are working through their statutory breaks and into the evening. A custody officer from Grampian said that no one will admit to workplace stress. All that is happening because of a fear of being the person whose job is identified as no longer being required. “Low morale and inefficiency,” is how a control-room operator from Strathclyde Police summed up the situation. He said that it was a case of “McWinsor in Scotland for police staff,” with cops being brought in to do the jobs of support staff, and that, at the same time, untold damage was being done to the culture of mutual support and respect in the Scottish police family.
Kenny MacAskill wants to talk about how bad things are in England because he does not want to face up to how bad things are in Scotland. He wants to talk about numbers of police officers rather than about what those officers will be paid to do because he does not want to admit that more and more of them will be forced to become backroom bobbies. Sooner or later, the cabinet secretary will have to face up to reality. Unless he does so soon, his legacy will be a police service that is starved of resources, a governance structure that is divided against itself and a loss of confidence among officers and staff at the grass roots.
If that happens, the biggest losers will be the communities of Scotland, which the police are there to protect and serve. The new service goes live in only a few days’ time. It is time for the Government to start listening.
I move amendment S4M-05899.1, to leave out from first “believes” to “service” and insert:
“considers that many of these uncertainties could have been avoided by improving the accountability and transparency of both the Police Service of Scotland and the Scottish Police Authority; notes the clear and repeated warnings from the chief constable and the staff union, Unison, that current spending and staffing plans are unsustainable; believes that the scale of cuts in police staff numbers will result in backfilling of civilian posts by police officers, reducing the effectiveness of the service;”
15:01
I welcome the opportunity to debate the implementation of the single police force, which is due to take effect in less than three weeks, and I commend the Liberal Democrats for securing an important debate.
Although the Scottish Conservatives supported the basic principle of a single police force during the passage of the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Bill, concerns about how the Scottish National Party intended to implement the policy were such that the Conservatives were subsequently unable to support the bill at stage 3. Those concerns included the worry that the bill, as drafted by the Government, would damage the local accountability of policing. It was also felt that there was vagueness about the relationship between the SPA and local authorities, and uncertainties surrounding the potential savings.
In an attempt to address those issues, a number of amendments were lodged at stage 2. Unfortunately, the proposals that they made fell on deaf ears and the SNP used its majority in the Justice Committee and in the Parliament to vote against the vast majority of the amendments that had been lodged by the Conservatives and other Opposition parties.
It is now evident that those concerns were just the tip of the iceberg. It is not surprising, therefore, that the Scottish Conservatives not only sympathise with but fully support the Liberal Democrats’ motion and will seek to amend it only to ensure that a full business case forms part of the review and that the 2012 act will be amended to take account of the review findings.
If members are in any doubt about why it is important that a full business case be included as part of the review, they should consider the fact that it has been clear from the outset that the motivation for a single police force has been primarily financial. Despite that, the SNP refused to publish a full business case ahead of the passing of the bill and rejected the Scottish Conservatives’ stage 2 amendment that called for that to be done before its implementation. Our amendment to compel the Auditor General for Scotland to review the savings that had been made by the creation of a single police force “as soon as practicable” after its establishment was also rejected at stage 2.
To date, only an outline business case has been published—that was done in July 2011. In it, the SNP predicted that the single force would result in savings of £130 million a year and £1.7 billion over 15 years. It estimated that the initial set-up costs would be £92 million.
During the bill’s passage, Chief Constable Smith of the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland said the outline business case that had been produced was
“never intended ... to be a document that contained sufficient detail on which to base significant decisions about investment and savings.”—[Official Report, Justice Committee, 28 February 2012; c 971-2.]
The Scottish Government’s response was merely to state that a full business case was a matter for the single police force. It added that it
“expects the full business case to be completed at the earliest opportunity available to the new services.”
When the implementation of the single force was debated in December 2012, SNP back benchers said that the debate was premature because the SPA chair, Vic Emery, had promised that the structures of the single police force would be in place before the end of the year. Well, January and February have passed and still no detail has been decided about who will control some civilian staff.
Meanwhile, the dispute between the SPA chair and the chief constable has already cost £6,300 in legal fees, with the compromise solution likely to result in considerable duplication of those staff.
Furthermore, the cost of making the temporary headquarters at Tulliallan fit for purpose is now known to be £700,000.
You are in your last minute.
It has also been reported that the redundancy bill for civilian staff is likely to reach £60 million. In addition, a parliamentary question from my colleague John Lamont revealed that the single police force will start life owing more than £100 million in outstanding debt accumulated by Scotland’s eight police forces and that interest amounting to £6 million per annum is due.
The potential savings articulated by the SNP in July 2011 now appear grossly overstated and wildly optimistic. Given that and the facts as highlighted, the Scottish Government must carry out an urgent review of the legislation, including making a long overdue full business case, in an effort to provide clarity regarding the functions and responsibilities of the SPA and report back to the Parliament on the necessary reforms to the legislation.
I move amendment S4M-05899.2, to leave out from “whether the” to “amended” and insert:
“the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012, which should include the publication of a full business case for the single police force and, in light of this review, to amend the Act”.
We are very tight for time—members have four minutes for speeches. I call Christine Grahame, to be followed by Graeme Pearson.
15:06
Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. In four minutes I will try to touch on some points, but not all.
Alison McInnes is right to raise concerns that the single force could undermine local delivery and local needs. It is a fair enough concern, but for me it is not proven. If I thought that it had merit I would certainly say so. The cabinet secretary has already referred to the policing plans in place for every single ward, which I think is pretty local. Given that local commanders have been designated for all 14 divisions, I do not see 1 April as a big bang. The people of Melrose or Gorebridge will see no difference in local policing. Indeed, it may improve because of increased numbers.
In England, many police look enviously at Scotland because of our single force. Every shire having an officer at every level is costly, a waste of money and sometimes leads to bad policing. The police commissioner elections, as already mentioned, cost £75 million with a 14.9 per cent turnout. Surely the Liberal Democrats cannot say that that would be a better solution for Scotland. Lots of chiefs at the cost of Indians—give me Indians anytime. Jobs have been lost in England: 5,000 police officers have gone and another 16,000 are at risk. What do you think the morale of police in England is like?
I will give you a topical example of where a single force would be a huge asset. In the Jimmy Savile case, various English police forces had been aware over decades of complaints that Jimmy Savile was committing serious sexual offences. There was no liaison or communication between those forces, so he was able to offend for decades. With a centralised police force, the communication on serious crimes involving predatory and peripatetic criminals would be much, much better and might prevent such events from happening.
Would Christine Grahame not accept that the opposite of that argument is that Dumfries and Galloway constabulary was not big enough to investigate Lockerbie?
Yes, indeed. That is why I am saying that, with a centralised police force, a big incident such as that would be dealt with by a serious crime squad. That is where we really need a centralised police force.
Local policing is required for local issues such as vandalism, burglaries and so on that take place in local areas—there are crimes that are specific to areas, such as the theft of sheep and cattle and so on in rural areas—but a single police force would be an advantage on big issues and in cases of predatory, peripatetic criminals.
I will move quickly on to staffing. The handling of people management has been a huge issue. The worst thing that can happen to people—civilians or uniformed police—is not to know what is going on. I have raised that with the cabinet secretary privately and in public, and I think that letters should have been written and communications should have been made to people—particularly civilian staff—about what was going on. People need to know that they are not going to be told at the last minute what is happening. I hope that something is in hand to address that.
You are in your final minute.
My last point is to invite you all—you are all coming and can have a wonderful time. I have here a letter signed by Vic Emery and Stephen House—it has no blood and no tears on it; they have signed it happily—and I am chairing a meeting tomorrow at which they will make a presentation about how they will work together and at which you can question them.
Alison, I am sorry, but your debate would have been better held after that meeting, because at it you will be able to ask all those questions that you have about local policing and who is appointing whom.
Speak through the chair, please.
I beg your pardon. I am speaking through the chair again.
I expect all the Liberal Democrats to attend that meeting and I look forward to their having the answers to all their questions.
The sub-committee, the motion for which will come before the Parliament today, will meet next Tuesday. It will not supplant the Justice Committee. Some of the members of that sub-committee are looking at me now. I am sure that they will give the SPA a hard time.
15:10
For 38 years, officers and staff from eight police forces and, more recently, the Scottish Crime and Drugs Enforcement Agency and the Scottish Police Services Authority have served the public throughout Scotland for the most part in an exemplary and professional manner. I take the opportunity to acknowledge that many have given their time—and, sometimes, their lives—selflessly, providing security and safety for others.
However, recent evidence demonstrates that some senior people have failed to learn the lessons from the experience of the SPSA. I find it difficult to understand why, if matters were so clear and functions were so well understood, the Lord Advocate, the chief constable, the chair of the Scottish Police Authority, the minister and civil servants required to meet to broker some kind of outcome.
Now is the moment for the Government to commit clearly—in unequivocal, unambiguous terms—to the chief constable being the one who commands and directs while the SPA provides effective governance and accountability by means of a scheme of authority or delegation. I would like to see that scheme of authority. In that regard, I look forward to the policing event in the Parliament tomorrow, which was mentioned earlier.
In that context, the SNP amendment is disappointing in its tone of self-congratulation, complacent in its understanding of the pressing needs that these organisations face and lazy in its analysis of current trends in crime recording, bearing in mind the fact that America, Canada, many parts of Europe and even the cabinet secretary’s favourite—south of the border—all face significant falls in recorded crime.
That observation does not detract in any way from the hard work that is done by officers and staff. It merely reinforces the point that the loss of 1,000 police staff posts has been the cost of the additional 1,000 police officers. Some of the staff who have been lost are the people who ensured that criminals are caught in a modern Scotland. They worked as civilians in forensics or financial investigation or managed, analysed and linked crime trend statistics on behalf of police officers to enable them to arrest repeat offenders at all levels.
I have much to say but little time.
The SPA must ensure that it fulfils its responsibilities to forensic science by creating a cutting-edge service in a world where LGC Ltd and the forensic science services are struggling. Scotland has witnessed enough bean counting in that area over the past years. The Gartcosh crime campus offers a new beginning for forensic science alongside the specialist capabilities of counterterrorism and organised crime investigators. The chief constable and the SPA should take that opportunity.
The inability of current police forces to link information and intelligence systems effectively was demonstrated yet again by the Savile debacle. Ten years ago, lessons from the Soham murders pointed the way forward in that regard. Scotland was in the lead, with its Scottish intelligence database. The SPA must commit to delivering again a world-class information technology network—secure, linked and effective in its command and control operations.
I look forward to proper democratic oversight of forthcoming developments, and I support the motion as amended by Lewis Macdonald’s amendment.
15:14
I, too, thank all those involved in the police service whom Graeme Pearson mentioned—officers and staff alike—who make our communities much safer for the members of the public we serve.
We have a short time allocated to the debate. I therefore limit my comments to the motion and the amendments. I will deal with the Liberal Democrats motion first. It refers to a “democratic deficit”. As has been pointed out, it is worth mentioning that there are designated local commanders for all 14 divisions. They will work with local elected councillors and community planning partnerships to shape local services and prioritise needs. That is a good thing. There is also a local policing plan for every single council ward, which will ensure that policing across Scotland reflects the needs of our communities, which I think is what the Liberal Democrats are looking for. I would have thought that that was self-explanatory. That is a wholly democratic system.
Will the member take an intervention?
I am sorry, but I have only four minutes.
I bumped into Councillor Paul Rooney, who is a Labour councillor in Glasgow City Council and a highly respected member of Strathclyde police authority. He will be a member of the new board. When I asked him how he felt about the new board, he told me that he was honoured to be on it, so perhaps Labour should speak to its own colleagues. I hold Councillor Rooney in high esteem.
The Labour amendment focuses on the backfilling of civilian posts, which is an issue that Lewis Macdonald mentioned. I attended the meeting that Lewis Macdonald referred to and I spoke to individual members of staff. However, we must also remember what Stephen House said about backfilling in response to Jenny Marra’s questions in the Justice Committee. He said:
“I believe that Police Scotland needs a balanced and integrated workforce of Police Officers and Police Staff. I would be keen to examine ways to improve that balance within our agreed budget. But I must repeat that we do not have a strategy or plan to backfill Police Staff Roles with Police Officers. I want as many Officers as possible to be on the street in an operational role”.
Will the member take an intervention?
I am sorry, but I have only a couple of minutes left.
Stephen House also said:
“there is no plan or strategy for reform that I am in charge of that is predicated on backfilling.”—[Official Report, Justice Committee, 23 October 2012; c 1851.]
Members must listen to what the chief constable said on that topic.
I want to touch on the Conservatives’ amendment. I am not sure whether Margaret Mitchell will remember that the Conservatives called for directly elected police commissioners during the stage 3 debate. We do not have to cast our minds back too far to remember what happened in England and Wales when they had directly elected police commissioners. The elections resulted in a turnout of 14.9 per cent at a cost of—wait for it—£75 million. Is that the Conservatives’ contribution to the debate? They want to spend on police commissioners when we can have a single police force and locally elected police boards that will serve all communities.
15:18
One thing that was abundantly clear about the 2011 Scottish parliamentary elections was that, despite the Liberal Democrats giving their opposition to a national police force prominence, it was not a vote winner. Notwithstanding that, they opposed the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Bill all the way from stage 1 in committee to the conclusion in the chamber last year in support of their view that local is best. That debate was comprehensively lost, and it is time that the Lib Dems accepted that and the fact that we have a new structure in which there is a designated local commander in all 14 divisions who will be involved with all local councillors, not just those few councillors on police boards.
There will also be a local police plan for each of Scotland’s 353 council wards. Stephen House advised in evidence in November 2012 that those plans would concentrate on the top three concerns in each ward and what the police would do about those concerns in the next 12 months. That really is a local level of police priority.
I accept that the issue of democracy and whether there is a democratic deficit in the new arrangements was discussed by many during the passage of the bill. The former Auditor General for Scotland, Robert Back, raised the issue in his evidence; Graeme Pearson has been resolute in his view that the Scottish Police Authority, as designed, did not offer democratic accountability; and John Finnie proposed a sub-committee of the Justice Committee to scrutinise the reforms at an early stage. He, of course, proposed an amendment that would commit Parliament to keeping the act’s operation under review. We are, of course, in the process of setting up that sub-committee and I wish it well in its task.
Concerns from the Liberal Democrats about the Scottish Police Authority adopting a service provider role were not evident in debate about the bill. There was discussion about the operation of forensic services and the extent to which the chief constable should have operational control over forensic crime scene examination. That issue was resolved on the basis that the Scottish Police Authority and not the chief constable will have direct responsibility for the forensic service but the chief constable and his command will decide which crime scenes the forensic service goes to—a sensible arrangement.
We did not have any real debate about the HR and finance functions and who should call the shots—perhaps we should have. We certainly did not hear about any Liberal Democrat concerns on those issues. However, what became clear in November was that there was a difference of approach between the new chief constable and the chairman of the SPA—a turf war, which is never edifying. Justice Committee members remember the discussion by both parties along the lines of, “I’ll show you my legal advice if you show me yours.” As Alison McInnes will be aware, however, the Justice Committee agreed with the request that neither side’s legal advice should be published. We need to accept that. Speaking as a member of the Faculty of Advocates, I point out that the fact that there were two differing legal views on the legislation is hardly earth shattering.
We should avoid accepting the argument that, somehow or other, the answer now is legislative change. If the Liberal Democrats think that it is, they should say why in clear and unequivocal terms. Moreover, those issues have been addressed in the dialogue that has occurred since November. What the police service needs now is not new legislation but an acknowledgement that it is progressing on the road to eliminating duplication and an acknowledgement that it needs to progress the issue of dealing with voluntary redundancies in an efficient and sensitive way, while recognising the necessity to keep communities safe and building on the decrease in crime rates.
The contrast between north of the border and south of the border—where the Liberal Democrats are in government—could not be clearer. I have no doubt which model the people of Scotland would prefer.
15:22
The debate has demonstrated a significant and justified concern over the implementation of a single police force. Although that concern may not, as yet, be on the radar screen of the general public, if the safety of Scotland’s communities is in any way thought to be at risk, it certainly will be.
Those who work for the police are concerned. Many of them do not know whether they will have a job in the single force, less than three weeks before that force is due to be established. Those in charge of the single police force are concerned. Chief Constable Stephen House told the Justice Committee that he had identified
“a gobsmacking major problem with the legislation.”—[Official Report, Justice Committee, 27 November 2012; c 2119.]
Vic Emery, chairman of the Scottish Police Authority, is concerned. He responded to the Government’s intervention in January with the warning:
“the board’s reservoir of patience with the protracted nature of resolving this kind of issue is already running low.”
In any major organisational change, teething problems could be expected, but this level of confusion and fundamental disagreement is alarming. It boils down to the basic issue of who calls the shots in the new single police force. Is it the chief constable, as the most senior police officer in Scotland, or the administrative head of the Scottish Police Authority who controls the purse strings? At the moment, we have two jockeys on one horse, which is an impossible situation.
That Christine Grahame, at this stage, should be asked to mediate or to hold the jackets—depending on how you look at it—at a meeting of the two protagonists says it all. That such confusion should prevail, with less than a month to go—
Will the member take an intervention?
I am tight for time. I am sorry. I am merely reiterating what Ms Grahame confirmed to the chamber.
That such confusion should prevail, with less than a month to go, is an indictment of the Scottish Government’s handling of the matter.
My party strongly supports the Lib Dem call for a review of the legislation. We have to clarify two points: who is in charge of what, and, most important, who is in overall control. It is appropriate that such a review includes clarity of the business case, as called for by my colleague Margaret Mitchell.
One person, in blissful solitude, is not concerned—the First Minister. Last week, he said that he was not being kept awake by the leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats. Despite the obvious flaws in the new police force structure and the ensuing widespread concerns, it appears that the First Minister is not being kept awake by that either. He has dismissed the dispute over police staff as “creative tension”—there is a classic first ministerial euphemism. This is not a production of “Macbeth”; this is how we run Scotland’s police force.
Although we are supportive of the principle of a single police force, the Scottish Conservatives always maintained that it could be created only if it went hand in hand with direct democratic safeguards, which the SNP rejected. Although we could not have predicted this particular spat between two prominent individuals, we did not vote for the bill because we did not think that it had been properly thought out and because, as Alison McInnes said, the SNP used its majority to vote against nearly all the Opposition amendments that would have improved it.
Significantly, this mess has arisen at the 11th hour because the SNP has dictated the timetable for the changeover although it was warned time and again of the challenges that were involved in railroading the measures through.
So, where are we now? Around 6,000 police staff still do not know about their future; the agreement between the SPA and police Scotland will result in a duplication of services, which is a waste of money; there is anecdotal evidence that front-line officers are being recalled to replace civilian staff; and, amid all this confusion, we do not know who calls the shots in the new single police force: a chief constable or an administrative head.
The Scottish Government needs to sort that mess out, which is why I support the motion in the name of Alison McInnes and the amendment in the name of Margaret Mitchell.
Before I call Jenny Marra, I remind all members who have taken part in the debate that they should be in the chamber.
15:26
The cabinet secretary’s words today have done little to alleviate the frustration that is felt around the chamber about the progress that is being made towards our single service. Chief among our concerns is his continuing assertion that there are 1,000 extra police officers on our streets. Time after time, Labour has told him what Unison and Audit Scotland have also told him, which is that those officers are not on our streets but are filling backroom posts in police stations. His own figures show a drop of 907 police staff since 2010.
We know from the chief constable, and from leaked documents from the police reform group in the cabinet secretary’s department, that the 1,000-officer commitment will be unsustainable in the single service as more staff jobs are cut.
Why is the commitment to 1,000 extra police officers a matter for the cabinet secretary but, according to the answer that I was given earlier, police station closures are not and are, instead, an operational matter? The truth is that bad news is an operational matter and good news is a political commitment by this bountiful Government.
The gulf between what the cabinet secretary says and the reality of what is happening in police stations across Scotland is astounding. In his own constituency, police custody officers are being replaced by police officers. The people of his constituency and the rest of Scotland are looking to the cabinet secretary to make the decisions that will keep their communities safe, and they are being let down time and again by his lack of leadership on police reform.
Nowhere is that more demonstrable than in his handling of the power struggle at the top of the single service. Yet again, the cabinet secretary has told us that responsibilities are clear between the SPA and the chief constable, but that is in deep contrast to the views of the chief constable himself.
As Lewis Macdonald said in his opening speech, that uncertainty could have been avoided if the cabinet secretary had accepted many of the amendments from across the chamber, including Labour’s amendments to increase accountability and transparency in the SPA and the police service of Scotland. However, those amendments were rejected out of hand and, as Alison McInnes said, we still need meaningful action. It is because of the cabinet secretary’s refusal to commit to greater accountability from the outset, and his sustained denial of the power struggle between Mr House and Mr Emery, that we believe that the Government should urgently consider the way in which the legislation is being interpreted.
With the single service starting in just over two weeks, we share the concerns of police staff, unions and the public that the cabinet secretary’s lack of leadership is posing a risk to its success. People need to know that their jobs are secure and that cuts will not creep in through the back door as “operational decisions”, and they need to be clear about who is in charge of the day-to-day running of the service. It is for them that we urge the cabinet secretary to take ownership, display leadership and commit to taking action to protect local policing today. Most important of all, we urge him to open his ears and start listening to the reality of what is happening on the ground.
I call the cabinet secretary, Kenny MacAskill, to wind up, please, on behalf of the Government. You have six minutes.
15:30
I hesitate to be too harsh on Alison McInnes, because I appreciate that she has just been rolled out today to fight the good fight for the Liberal Democrats. She has always been polite and supportive in committee.
For the Liberal Democrats, the issue started in 2011, when Tavish Scott said that the most important issue in Scotland was the threat of a single police service. The outcome was that the Liberal Democrats lost 71 per cent of their seats, 51 per cent of their constituency vote and 54 per cent of their regional vote.
Under Willie Rennie’s leadership, they continued to protest that the move to a single police force was the most significant issue, and they lost half their vote and half their councillors. That is the position that the Liberal Democrats have taken, and that is the judgment that has been cast upon them by the people of Scotland.
Does the justice secretary have anything to say about the police?
I am just coming on to that.
People sometimes seem, in the chamber, to be living in a parallel universe. Mr Pearson made the point that the reduction in crime is a western phenomenon. I agree with him on that, but our 37-year low is significantly better than the position south of the border.
Will the cabinet secretary give way?
I will not, at the moment.
In the opening and closing speeches, I have heard not one word of praise for the police. Mr Pearson gestured towards that in commenting on the police’s work—which is outstanding—but the rest was just, “Woe is us”, because Scotland is apparently in a dreadful position and the country is collapsing. However, we have a 37-year low in recorded crime, we have an 18-year low in the number of crimes involving the carrying of an offensive weapon and we have a record number of police, which Labour would not commit to—Mr Macdonald would not even give us the number to which Labour would reduce the police. That is why I say that there is a parallel universe.
I am grateful to the cabinet secretary for stepping outside his parallel universe for a moment. I hope that he heard me say in my speech that the absolutely central relationship of mutual trust and support that should exist between police officers and police staff is under threat from the policy approach that he has taken. Reflecting on the importance of that relationship, will he say something now about what he will do to repair the damage that has already been done?
There was not much in that interjection that I was not going to come on to deal with.
As I said, we have an outstanding police service—even if the Opposition’s spokespeople are not prepared to praise it.
Will the cabinet secretary give way?
By all means, I will give way to Ms Goldie. She has been trying.
Will the cabinet secretary take this opportunity to remind members that he wanted to increase the number of Scottish police officers by 500, but the Scottish Conservatives, out of respect for the police, forced an increase of 1,000 officers?
I will not hesitate, in that case, to comment on the position following plebgate or, indeed, to say that the Tories seem to want not just some police officers to be removed, but even more to be removed.
We have an outstanding police service, which we need to maintain while dealing with the challenge of the huge cuts coming from the Tory-Liberal coalition south of the border. Irrespective of whether the UK Government is reducing officer numbers, whether it is implementing a greater reduction in back-office staff than here or whether it is attacking the terms and conditions of those who serve, we will not do so. We will ensure that reform improves and adds to the outstanding service that we have.
For the first time, we will have a national police rape investigation unit, so that all of Scotland can deal with that challenge because the skills that we possess in various areas will be available in every area of Scotland. We will be able to deal with matters such as border patrol and border policing when we face difficulties, whether that is at Cairnryan—which must currently be dealt with by Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary, despite its size—or at Glasgow airport for other incidents. We will get improved service.
At the same time, we will maintain and increase democratic accountability. I see Mr McArthur sitting on the Liberal Democrat benches; I recall meeting his Orkney Islands Council colleagues who indicated that, under the current system, they have two members on the board of Northern Constabulary. Under the single service, they will have a committee and it will be up to them whether to have a full committee of the council or a committee for those members. They will have greater accountability and scrutiny and they will have their own dedicated divisional commander, who will, at their request, be the current serving officer.
The cabinet secretary will know that the Justice Committee spent a great deal of time taking evidence on that. We considered amendments at stage 2 that would have ensured that, if there was no agreement on local policing plans, there would be some way of resolving that, but he refused to accept any of those amendments. There is no real local accountability; there is some good will.
There is significantly greater accountability than was the case with two council members going once a month to Inverness to be entertained by the chief constable.
Rod Campbell correctly said that the situation has been unedifying. Vic Emery and Stephen House would acknowledge that some of what has appeared in the newspapers has been unedifying. Let us be clear that the two of them are working hard with those who serve under them to ensure that, when the service goes live on 1 April, the current outstanding service will be maintained. They are individuals of the highest integrity—one is an outstanding police officer and the other has an outstanding record of service in business.
Will the cabinet secretary give way?
I do not have time.
Both of them will put the police service in a better position. I look forward to their appearance tomorrow at the meeting that will be convened by the Justice Committee convener. That shows that, whatever tittle-tattle Opposition members might put forward, Vic Emery and Stephen House are working publicly to deliver an outstanding service. The Government stands up and supports the police service in Scotland, even if no other party in the chamber does.
15:36
The Cabinet Secretary for Justice should take a moment to reflect on the comments towards the end of his speech in which he accused senior councillors holding the police to account of being on a junket with a chief constable. That kind of behaviour is unacceptable.
Kenny MacAskill rose—
I will not take an intervention, so the cabinet secretary can sit down.
He should also reflect on his misrepresentation of the chief constable. On 20 December, in a letter to the Justice Committee, the chief constable said:
“I am increasingly of the view that the only satisfactory resolution will be a change to legislation in order to address the matter fully.”
Those were the chief constable’s words. If the cabinet secretary disagrees, he should clarify that now.
Mr Rennie probably has not met Mr House recently. I have. It would be best for Mr Rennie to turn up at the meeting tomorrow with Mr House and Mr Emery and listen to what Mr House says. He is clear that he sees no requirement at present for any legislative change, and he is working towards making our police service outstanding.
Was that after a meeting with the Lord Advocate and all his colleagues to ensure that the chief constable was brought into line? The Cabinet Secretary for Justice did not dispute the fact that the quotation is absolutely accurate
.
Kenny MacAskill adopts a kind of squirrel approach to politics that involves talking about anything at all anywhere else other than our responsibilities here. He did not include in his remarks any reference to the fact that, in England, crime is at its lowest since records began. We hear repeatedly about the level in Scotland, and good progress has been made, but we are not alone in that. He also needs to recognise that there are big divisions in his own ranks. There are divisions between civilian staff and police officers over their jobs. There are divisions at the Scottish Police College at Tulliallan, which were at the centre of the issues, and there are divisions with Unison.
Margaret Mitchell is correct to call for a full business case, because we have not had a business case so far.
When Christine Grahame talked about the Savile case, she was arguing for there to be no boundaries at all between organisations. Is she arguing for a United Kingdom-wide police force and saying that that is the only way we will ever be able to resolve the problems? We will have boundaries between organisations. The issue that we need to tackle is to do with communications between organisations and the use of technology. We need smooth communication if we are to deal with such issues.
Senior police officers in England have said that the problem in the Savile case was lack of communication between various divisions where incidents took place and complaints were made. My interpretation is that, in Scotland, with a single police force, the information and data that are collected for very serious crimes—to which Graeme Pearson referred—will help to ensure that people like Jimmy Savile are brought to book before they can commit further crimes. The problem in England was that there were too many police dealing with things but not communicating with one another. The single police force will help with communication.
We need to have smooth communications between all public bodies—between social work, education services and the police. The logic of Christine Grahame’s argument is that we should have one big public service organisation. There needs to be smooth communications between all services; otherwise, we end up with the idea that biggest is always best.
Graeme Pearson is absolutely right when he talks about the Lord Advocate and patience running low. If things were so smooth and cordial, why was the Lord Advocate required to resolve the issue?
Sandra White’s point about local councillors having direct access to and influence over the police is a very interesting one. If local councillors were to disagree fundamentally with something that the police service’s chief constable had planned for their area or for a wider area, what power would they have? Do they have any ability to reject his plans? I suspect that they do not.
Rod Campbell said that there were no debates about operational independence. He obviously was not listening. My colleague Alison McInnes tells me that there were endless debates about it. He was not listening, and neither was the justice secretary.
There is a major issue here, which has shattered confidence in the police and among police officers. We have pitted the SPA against the chief constable and civilian staff against the police officers. Councillors have been stripped of real control over their police. Furthermore, cuts are being delivered, rather than the savings that were promised. The fear is that more is to come. Will we see the closure of local police stations and control rooms and the return—as the Labour Party has rightly identified—of the backroom bobbies? Will there be cuts to critical backroom staff, who are central to the efficient running of the service?
Will the member take an intervention?
I will not, just now.
What other areas will the SFA interfere with?
The SFA?
I mean the SPA. As one member of the board has asked, will the Scottish Police Authority want to investigate police operations? What creeping interference will there be from the SPA?
We need fresh legislation.
Will the member take an intervention now?
I will not, just now.
If we can get fresh legislation, we might be able to deal with the crisis within the police.
By instinct, Liberal Democrats are distrustful of central power and control. That distrust is built on three solid beliefs: first, the inability of the man in the ministry fully to reflect the wide and varied needs of different communities; secondly, the faith and power of communities to do good; and thirdly, the fact that, when a crisis inevitably comes, power dispersed is safer power. The 2012 act does not just run counter to those beliefs—it is an insult to the communities that the Government is supposed to be serving. Those principles are why we were resolute in our opposition to centralisation of the police when others around us were attracted by the bright lights of shiny new uniforms.
I have always believed that Parliament would regret passing the police centralisation bill—now the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012, but I thought that it might be for future generations to regret the actions of its founders. I did not believe that those actions would be regretted by this generation, and so quickly. The founders of the 2012 act—Kenny MacAskill and Roseanna Cunningham—will be remembered. We might say that never in the field of Scottish justice were so few resented so much by so many. It is not so much about fixing something that was not broken as about breaking something that was already fixed.
Before the new force even exists, it will already have achieved some astounding feats: it will have turned civilian staff against police officers, turned the SPA against the police and turned the police’s back against local communities. I did not believe that it would be possible, but the Government has turned a crime fighting force into an infighting force. It has been a farce, not because the Scottish Government has lost control but because it grabbed control.
Now, we must put the situation right—restoring what was right before the Government broke it. We need fresh legislation for the sake of security, for the sake of the justice system and for the sake of ministers’ red faces. The Government must act, and act now.
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Portfolio Question Time