- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Friday, 09 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is on the comments of the Chief Constable of Strathclyde Police to the Justice Committee on 6 October 2009 in relation to possible staff redundancies that “at some point, if we could not balance the books, we would have to consider compulsory redundancies. I would look to shrink the police staff numbers before I shrunk police officer numbers” (Official Report c. 2271) and those of Dave Watson of Unison that the focus on police numbers is the wrong one (Official Report c. 2283).
Answer
The composition of police staff is an operational matter for chief constables. This government is providing specific funding directly to police authorities to deliver on our commitment to providing an additional 1,000 police officers in our communities by 2011. This commitment has been supported across Parliament and was a recommendation by the Justice Committee in its enquiry into community policing:
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/s3/committees/justice/reports-08/jur08-18.htm#25.
We are also committed to ensuring that we have a modern and efficient police service in Scotland, which includes the use of civilian members of staff where that makes operational sense.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Friday, 09 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is on the comments of Calum Steele of the Scottish Police Federation to the Justice Committee on 6 October 2009 that “the fundamental duty of any Government must be the safety and security of the public. My fairly simple position is that cuts in funding are simply wrong” (Official Report c. 2284).
Answer
For 2010-11, we are faced with a £500 million cut in planned expenditure imposed on Scotland by the UK Government, and accelerated capital expenditure. However, despite this pressure we are providing an increase of 3.1% in police grant, which is £586.7 million in 2010-11 and providing direct funding for the 1,000 extra police officers in our communities. In addition, from 2010-11 the liability for police pensions will transfer from police authorities to the Scottish Government. The Scottish Government has not therefore reduced the funding it provides for the police in Scotland.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Friday, 09 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is on the comments of the Chief Constable of Strathclyde Police to the Justice Committee on 6 October 2009 in relation to possible staff redundancies that “I am afraid that I take a fairly clear position on that. The public want to see police officers; therefore, we would turn first to the police support staff for voluntary redundancies” (Official Report c. 2271).
Answer
I refer the member to the answer to question S3W-28155 on 27 October 2009. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament''s website, the search facility for which can be found at
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/PQA/Default.aspx.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive what actions it has taken to address the absence of a commonly agreed definition of and inconsistencies in approach to community policing across Scotland as highlighted in the Justice Committee’s Report on Inquiry into Community Policing.
Answer
Following the Scottish Government''s work with police forces, police authority convenors and other key policing stakeholders on the development of the Community Policing Engagement Principles, I wrote to chief constables and convenors earlier this year to encourage the development of community policing engagement standards across all force areas. Work is ongoing across the country to develop these standards.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it is committed to maintaining the 1,000 extra police officers recruited since May 2007.
Answer
Yes. This is a priority for this government and I announced on 1 September that we now have 17,278 police officers in Scotland, which is 1,044 higher than at May 2007. The Scottish Government is directly paying for the recruitment, training and salary of 801 officers recruited since May 2007 and we are committed to meeting the costs of an additional 201 officers in 2010-11.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive how many police forces follow the approach to community policing taken by Strathclyde Police.
Answer
Each chief constable, working with local police authorities, is using their policing capacity and additional resources to best deliver the type of frontline policing that their communities want.
The report of the Justice Committee''s Inquiry into Community Policing acknowledged that a one size fits all model for community policing was not advantageous and that forces must be able to have flexibility to tailor their particular definition to their geography and populations. It is not, therefore, helpful to assess how one force model is or is not applied in another force area.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive what progress it has made on implementing each of the recommendations in the Justice Committee’s Report on Inquiry into Community Policing.
Answer
The development of the Community Policing Engagement Principles by the Scottish Government, and subsequent work being taken forward locally by police forces and police authorities to develop their own community policing engagement standards, takes full account of the recommendations of the Justice Committee.
In particular, the committee recognised the importance of ensuring that the Scottish Government met its pledge to deliver 1,000 additional officers over the life of this Parliament. In fact, we passed this milestone in June 2009, nearly two years early.
We have also given police authorities sufficient resources to maintain police numbers. Funding for police forces is at its highest ever level, £1.115 billion in 2009-10, which will help to ensure that local communities continue to grow safer and stronger.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Tuesday, 06 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive how it defines community policing.
Answer
Community policing refers to the way in which policing takes place in our communities. This is at the heart of the government''s commitment to strengthening operational policing in our communities.
The Community Policing Engagement Principles set out a template for police forces to describe how they engage with their communities at a local level.
Community policing directly contributes to the outcomes we seek in relation to people living their lives free of crime and in having strong, resilient and supportive communities where people take responsibility for their own actions and how they affect others.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Friday, 09 October 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 27 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it considers that any reduction in police staff numbers as described by the Chief Constable of Strathclyde Police to the Justice Committee on 6 October 2009 would impact on the roles carried out by police officers and is likely to negatively impact on the length of time that officers can dedicate to frontline policing (Official Report c. 2271) .
Answer
This government is providing specific funding directly to police authorities to deliver on our commitment to providing an additional 1,000 police officers in our communities by 2011. There is therefore no question of this commitment having a negative impact on the efficiency of police support services.
- Asked by: Richard Baker, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
-
Date lodged: Thursday, 17 September 2009
-
Current Status:
Answered by Elish Angiolini on 1 October 2009
To ask the Scottish Executive what its position is on reported comments of the Lord Advocate that in relation to life sentences there may be a need to review the range of punishment parts available to the courts to better reflect the seriousness of a crime, given the relatively compressed scale from 12 to 30 years that currently exists.
Answer
It is a matter for the court to determine the appropriate sentence to impose on a convicted person.
Section 108 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995, provides the Lord Advocate with a right of appeal against sentence on the grounds of undue leniency. A sentence will be unduly lenient if it falls outside the range of sentences which the judge, at first instance, applying his mind to all the relevant factors, could reasonably have considered appropriate.
The Crown is currently appealing three sentences for murder on the grounds that the disposals were unduly lenient. The appeals were conducted for the Crown by the Lord Advocate who asked the appeal court to consider giving further guidance under section 118 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 on the fixing of punishment parts in murder cases.
The court was asked to consider providing guidance under Section 118 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 on the appropriate starting points for fixing punishment parts and the perceived maximum for such punishment parts. The court was asked to consider giving further guidance on the factors to be taken into account in fixing punishment parts and she asked the court to consider issuing guidance on punishment parts in murder cases involving knives and swords.
As the appeal court has not yet issued its judgment, it is not appropriate to provide any further comment at this time.
