Hansard

Following on from what Jamie Greene said, I say that I think that all of us in Parliament can be proud that we live in a country that abides by the principle of policing by consent. At its most basic, that means that I and, I think, the rest of the Scottish public view our Police Service as being legitimate, with the implicit understanding that the police will be transparent about their powers, act with integrity while using those powers and be accountable for their actions.

As other members have done, I outline at the beginning of my speech that I fully trust that Scotland is greatly served by the outstanding diligence and commitment of our police officers and by the work that they do every day across the country to keep our communities safe. The Police (Ethics, Conduct and Scrutiny) (Scotland) Bill can be seen as a way to strengthen the social contract by reinforcing public confidence in our standards of police conduct.

As a member of the Criminal Justice Committee, I record my thanks to all those who gave evidence at stage 1—in particular, those with lived experience of the system. I also thank the excellent clerking team, who ably helped us to navigate what is clearly a very complicated landscape. I am very much with Pauline McNeill on that.

A recent Scottish Parliament information centre briefing acknowledges that news stories

“and incidents within the public domain across the UK may have contributed to an undermining of public confidence in the police and concerns around scrutiny of their behaviour”.

The bill seeks to improve how complaints about the police are dealt with in order to help to increase transparency and strengthen public confidence, which might have been undermined. The bill will benefit both the public and the police force.

The bill’s genesis, as we have heard, was the commissioning by the Scottish Government and its Lord Advocate of the independent review of complaints handling, which was led by the former Lord Advocate, Lady Elish Angiolini. Following the publication of the final report in late 2020, the Scottish Government ran a public consultation, feedback to which demonstrated broad support for the legislative changes that were recommended in the independent report.

I will take some time to go over each area of the bill, although, as I said, the committee felt that it is a complex area with a lot of interacting factors that must be taken into account, so this will be a brief overview.

Sections 2 and 3 cover police ethics. They include the creation of a statutory obligation for Police Scotland to have a code of ethics and will place a statutory duty of candour on individual officers and on Police Scotland, as an organisation. Not only will there be an obligation to introduce a code of ethics, but it will be the responsibility of the chief constable to regularly review and disseminate that code.

Those sections reflect the acknowledgement that those who hold the office of constable and have the powers of that office have a higher duty than others to account for their actions and record what they did or saw in the execution of their duties. An explicit duty of candour on individual constables and Police Scotland as a whole will therefore be introduced.

Sections 4 to 8 cover aspects of police conduct. They include amendment of the functions that can be conferred on the Police Investigations and Review Commissioner by providing the power to allow misconduct procedures to be applied to former officers, by introducing police advisory and barred lists, and by amending the misconduct procedures for senior officers.

The ability to allow misconduct procedures to be applied to former officers is an important way to ensure that justice can be pursued even after a police officer retires or resigns. Public confidence will also be greatly improved by the creation of barred and advisory lists, which will stop those who do not meet the high standards that are expected of police officers from gaining employment in policing.

As is highlighted in our report, the committee heard conflicting evidence on the merits of holding gross misconduct hearings in public. I welcome the cabinet secretary’s response, which provided clarity that any changes will be brought forward in secondary legislation. If that proposal goes ahead, provisions for vulnerable witnesses must be put in place. Given the evidence that we heard, I remain open minded as to which is the best option, and I am not totally convinced of the merits of the proposal. As we go forward into stage 2—assuming that the bill passes stage 1 tonight—we must ask what we are we trying to achieve through hearings being held in public. There were good arguments on both sides about that proposal.

Sections 9 to 16 refer to the functions of the Police Investigations and Review Commissioner. Those sections will grant significant new powers to the PIRC and will, in turn, strengthen its governance and accountability arrangements. Although those sections cover an extensive range of new powers, the key processes that they will introduce include the following: giving the PIRC the ability to investigate, when it is suspected that an offence was committed by a person who formerly served with the police; giving the PIRC the power to take over any consideration of complaints that are being dealt with by the chief constable or the Scottish Police Authority; placing an obligation on the PIRC to audit the arrangements for investigating whistleblowing complaints; granting the PIRC the means to review a policy or practice of the authority or Police Scotland, if the PIRC considers that that would be in the public interest; and giving the PIRC direct access to audit and review files in Police Scotland’s complaints database. Although that list is not exhaustive, those are some of the ways in which the bill seeks to enhance the efficiency, transparency and independence of the police complaints process and public confidence in it.

Section 17 covers governance of the PIRC and requires that there be a statutory advisory board to the commissioner. I believe that such a board will strengthen the PIRC’s decision making and will be beneficial to counselling the PIRC on governance and administrative matters.

From my time scrutinising the bill in committee, I can confirm that the committee acknowledged that the police complaints system must improve, both for those who make a complaint and for those who are the subject of a complaint. As others—in particular, the convener—have outlined, we heard compelling evidence from people who have experienced the system.

The committee believes that measures in the bill will improve the robustness, accountability and transparency of the police complaints system, and it welcomes greater powers for the PIRC and increased transparency around its investigations. The policy objective of the bill is

“to ensure that robust, clear and transparent mechanisms are in place for investigating complaints, allegations of misconduct, or other issues of concern in relation to the conduct of police officers in Scotland.”

I again record my gratitude to the hardworking and committed individuals who deliver such a high standard of policing in Scotland. The bill is mutually beneficial to those who work in the Police Service of Scotland and to the general public across Scotland, although, as others have highlighted, there will still be a lot of work to do if the bill progresses to stage 2. I will support the general principles of the bill this evening; I call on all my colleagues across the chamber to do likewise.