Central Scotland Police

The Police in Scotland

There are eight police forces in Scotland.

Responsibility for the Police

Three parties share legal responsibility for police forces in Scotland; the police authority, the chief constable and the Secretary of State for Scotland. This arrangement derives from the Police (Scotland) Act 1967.

The Police authorities

Each force is maintained by a Police authority or joint board. Joint Police boards now maintain 6 of the Scottish forces: Northern Constabulary, Central Scotland Police, Grampian Police, Lothian & Borders Police, Strathclyde Police and Tayside Police. Only Dumfries & Galloway and Fife Constabularies are directly administered by the councils for their geographical areas. Joint police boards are composed of representatives of each council in the force area.

The main responsibilities of the Police authorities are to:

• set the budget for the force and provide the chief constable with the resources (manpower, building and equipment) necessary to police the area adequately and efficiently; and
• appoint officers of the rank of Assistant Chief Constable and above.

The Chief Constable

The chief constable alone is responsible for police operations. While police authorities appoint the chief constables (subject to the approval of the Secretary of State), neither police authorities nor the Secretary of State have power to direct chief constables on enforcement of the law or on the deployment of police officers. The chief constable has a duty to comply with instructions from the Lord Advocate, the sheriff principal or the appropriate prosecutor in relation to offences and prosecutions. Efficient and effective use of the resources placed at his disposal by the police authority is a matter for the chief constable.

The chief constable is required by law to submit to the police authority an annual report on the policing of the force area. It is also copied to the Scottish Parliament. In line with the Justice Charter, this report is also published and made readily available to the public. It not only gives an account of the policing of the area during the past year in terms of statistical results, but also comments on the performance of the force against objectives and targets set by the chief constable for that year.

Finance

The police service is financed partly by central government and partly by local government. The local government contribution comes from the council rates and from the revenue support grant and non-domestic rate income provided to local authorities by central government. Police grant is paid by government at 51% of expenditure incurred by local authorities up to a specified limit.

Capital expenditure on the police is controlled by the system of capital expenditure consents to local authorities administered by the Scottish Parliament.