Hansard

When I spoke in the stage 1 debate on the bill, I reiterated the point, which has been made today, that we police by consent in Scotland. We ought to cherish that value, which can never be taken for granted. We all expect the highest standards of everybody in our police service, but we know that, by some, that trust has been well and truly broken. Equally, I make the point that passing laws that were born from a virtuous desire to root out malpractice or to fix procedural failures should never be done in a way that undermines greater morale among serving officers, nor should any such legislation be used as a loophole to remove unwanted characters from the force in situations in which conduct is not the issue but personality is.

Calum Steele did not mince his words when criticising the bill in The Herald today. I do not necessarily agree with everything that he wrote in his article, but he made some pretty prickly points. The loss of public confidence in Police Scotland is, in his view, largely thanks to a

“lack of training and organisational negligence”.

In his view, a litany of leadership issues have created the perfect environment for declining standards in Police Scotland. That is compounded by the fact that officers with limited experience are now serving as mentors to their peers and new recruits. When I was on my party’s front bench as shadow justice secretary, I recall raising on numerous occasions the fact that a loss of expertise in the higher ranks of Police Scotland would lead to newer and far less experienced officers making judgments that others might not have made.

That must all be seen against the backdrop of the vastly changed role of police officers in Scotland today. They are tackling a mental health crisis and picking up the pieces when every other broken public service has closed its doors and gone home. The backdrop also includes crumbling police buildings and cars, a lack of kit, information technology and software systems that leave much to be desired and, in my view, clear clashes in direction between those at the top of policing and those on the ground who are doing the work. I have witnessed and heard anecdotally that a glacial “them and us” environment exists between the leadership and the rank and file, and equally between civilian and commissioned roles in Police Scotland. The bill will not fix any of that; it conveniently ignores those long-standing organisational failures in Police Scotland.

David Kennedy, the current secretary of the SPF, wrote to every MSP yesterday and raised more worrying points about the bill. His concerns that vetting could be used as a poor substitute for misconduct practices and as a blunt tool to dismiss officers via the back door have been well debated today. I will not dance on the head of the procedural pin, but such substantive amendment should not have occurred without proper consultation at stage 1. It is unsatisfactory.

The public deserve due and robust complaints procedures. Unfortunately, however, we are now faced with the conundrum of being asked to support a bill whose aims and ambitions are broadly welcomed by victims organisations, for which I have the greatest respect, but whose detail has been described as problematic and concerning by the body that represents front-line officers. That is far from ideal.

I have no doubt that there are bad eggs in policing—as there are in any large public body—so the beefing up of the misconduct rules is broadly welcome. I also believe that too many people have been let down in the face of very complex complaints procedures. That, too, must be fixed. For some people, trust in Police Scotland has been lost forever due to what they deem to be institutional cover-ups fuelled by colleague camaraderie or even misplaced loyalty.

I will therefore support the bill today but, in supporting it, let us never forget that it is always the tiniest minority of police officers who fall short of our high expectations. I want victims and the public to know that we take misconduct seriously, but I also want every serving police officer and civilian member of staff in Police Scotland to know that the Parliament has their backs, too. Striking that balance has never been easy and it will never be easy, but it must be done for all of our sakes.