Chamber and committees

To be honest, you are avoiding the question that I am asking. I realise that there is scope for reform, but I would have thought that, from the policing point of view, the starting point is to acknowledge the huge amount of money that was taken out of the budget—around £2.5 billion.

There is surely not a great deal of scope to take much more money out of the budget. I know that we have already had this conversation. However, it is not as if any offer is on the table regarding the use of borrowing powers or carrying forward reserves. The Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 granted the power to the SPA to borrow money. We are having difficulty getting anyone to say why multiyear funding is not possible or why reserves cannot be carried forward, which Police Scotland used to be able to do. It is as though the power to do that never existed, but it did.

I have been trying to get in on fire as well.

Can someone get back to me on whether you will explore allowing Police Scotland to carry forward reserves? All eight of the previous forces could do that; it was not a big deal. I do not know whether an error was made at the time in not allowing the single police force to carry forward reserves.

Can you give a timescale for that?

Morning, everyone. I want to ask about policing. Cabinet secretary, you will be broadly familiar with the centralisation of the eight regional police forces. That resulted in many efficiencies, and £1 billion has been saved over the period since then and been returned to the Scottish budget, if you like. That is not an insignificant amount, and I will come back to that.

Prior to centralisation, the eight regional forces could carry reserves. However, for some reason, the ability to do that was not carried over into Police Scotland. I know that the current chief constable has raised the issue with you and previous justice secretaries. Perhaps Donald McGillivray might know more about the history of that. Have you explored that issue?

Are you open to the idea that things might be out of balance? People with machetes terrorising shop workers on Sauchiehall Street on Saturday nights is a regular occurrence. I am not picking a random case—that happens regularly. The local police cannot tell me whether a case has gone to the reporter or the fiscal. There seems to be a lack of transparency, so it is no wonder that the public have the perception that there are no consequences.

I am told that, as a matter of public policy—do not quote me, because I am not saying that this is correct, but when I have asked about it, I am told that this is the policy—a case where a machete was used would go to the fiscal, but if it was not used and, although the offender was terrorising people, they did not do anything with it, the case would not go to the fiscal. You do not need to respond to that—I am just saying that there is something wrong about that. Jimmy Paul of the Violence Reduction Unit said that there have been unintended consequences.

Sorry, but that is not my line of questioning. I agree with you on that; it has been really beneficial. However, do you acknowledge that the SPA has handed back £1 billion to the Government over the period since the reform?

I will cut to the chase. There will be discussions about public service reform. I want to know whether you can share with the committee what your view on the issue will be when you speak to Ivan McKee.

I can assure you that that is the figure: about £1 billion has been saved. You can correct me if I am wrong. It is good that there have been savings. However, some would argue that there is not much left to scrape from the barrel if you are looking to make further savings from Police Scotland. Will you acknowledge that?

I then want to ask about some of the things that you said in relation to modernisation and investment.

I would just like to have an answer on that at some point, if not today.

Three issues have been raised with you and your predecessor justice secretaries: borrowing, reserves and multiyear funding. I would like clarification on the issue of reserves at some point.

I think that the committee in general would be interested in that. I appreciate that—thank you.

The convener asked about custody suites, and I can confirm that what he said is the case. A good example is the Stewart Street police station in Glasgow. I was out with the police in Glasgow on Thursday afternoon, and I thank Police Scotland for hosting me. Following the closure of 300 cells, it now takes an inordinate amount of time to process a prisoner, so it seems like a no-brainer to consider an investment programme that would incorporate the opening up of more custody cells or the modernisation of existing ones.

From the answer that you gave to the convener, it sounded as though you were saying that we can ignore what is being said, because the chief constable has given you an assurance that people will continue to be arrested when that is needed. However, it seems obvious that that cannot be done unless more custody cells are provided.