Question reference: S5O-02848
- Asked by: Gil Paterson, MSP for Clydebank and Milngavie, Scottish National Party
- Date lodged: 23 January 2019
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Current status: Answered by Humza Yousaf on 31 January 2019
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what the justice secretary's position is on what the implications of a no deal Brexit could be for policing in Scotland.
Answer
Serious organised criminality and terrorism do not respect national borders. Leaving the EU without securing continued access to EU criminal justice measures - such as the European Arrest Warrant, the European Criminal Records Information System and the Second Generation Schengen Information System - will mean Scotland losing access to tools which allow the police and law enforcement agencies to tackle these challenges effectively. We have been working with Police Scotland to plan for this, but there is no doubt that fallback measures will be less effective. As I indicated in my reply to Bruce Crawford’s earlier question, the Chief Constable has decided to bring forward the recruitment of 120 officers in this financial year to ensure capacity and resilience is in place to prepare against a range of contingencies associated with Brexit.