Seòmar agus comataidhean

Again, I will bring in Don McGillivray on that, but I will first give another example. For some time in advance of COP26, all leave was cancelled for the police in Scotland, which will have consequences as people get their leave entitlement back, and that will continue beyond COP26. From talking to the police and, where necessary, the UK Government, I believe that there is an understanding of the cost. However, it becomes more difficult to attribute costs such as those that you mention. You are right in saying that increased activism is a good thing, and the police will have to respond to it.

Going back to previous questions, I do not want to speak too soon, as we still have three days of COP26 to go, but I think that Police Scotland’s reputation will be enhanced, notwithstanding the issue with kettling, which has been mentioned, and a number of other incidents such as when, early on, a decision was made to have local people, including women, walk through Kelvingrove park in the dark. That was wrong and the police have apologised for it. There are things to learn from the experience, but my feeling is that Police Scotland’s reputation will be incredibly enhanced internationally after the event, if things go as well as we hope they will for the next three days. That will bring opportunities as well, although these things are hard to quantify at this stage.

Of course, it is not just about the police. The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service had quite a bit of work to do in the run-up to COP26, and those costs are being covered as well. There are also costs for the Scottish Ambulance Service. As I said, we are pretty confident about the nature of the arrangements that are in place, and we are hearing from our justice partners that they are confident about that, too.

Don McGillivray might want to say more about legacy costs.

I would respond on that more generally. We might come on to discuss the replacement for Barlinnie, for instance. I hate to use this expression, but how such things can be the most energy efficient is much more baked in from the start now. I am aware, from my previous area of responsibility, that that is being done in relation to housing. I do not know whether district heating is specifically being considered in this context, but reducing the carbon footprint is certainly factored into any new build.

I go back to a point that the convener made. In my area, we have one police station in Clackmannanshire, and it has now moved into the council headquarters. That would not be suitable for a fire station, for obvious reasons, but we would want our public bodies—the police, the fire service and the Scottish Ambulance Service, too—to think more cogently about working together on some things. That can massively reduce costs and increase efficiency. Where there are new facilities, that would allow for initiatives around district heating systems or otherwise reducing the carbon footprint. For the fire service, one such area will be the electrification of the fleet. I imagine that that would be a big area for the service.

I might ask Don McGillivray to come in on that. As everybody knows, there has been a process of rationalisation of police stations over the years. As those in the Fire and Rescue Service would tell you—as they have told me directly—some fire stations are perhaps not in the right place. I was in one last week on my own patch, in Alloa. Sometimes, they are not in the right type of buildings, given the new equipment.

I do not know whether Don McGillivray wishes to say more on that.

To go back to the first point, it is incontrovertible that overall grant funding from the Treasury is falling. I have that as a quote and I am happy to source that for SPICe or anybody else. The exchange that we are having exemplifies the fact that politicians choose the figures that best serve their purpose. That is true, but you cannot deny the fact that Covid did not stop when that budget started. There are huge continuing Covid costs across Government. It is disingenuous to try to take those costs out to get to a lower budget starting point, but that discussion will continue.

The police budget has increased over the years, despite the fact that we have had major cuts to our capital budget over the past decade. In the past three years, there has been a substantial increase, which has resulted in the capital budget staying at about £45 million. We have recognised some additional demands from the police, including £10 million for greening the fleet.

We are ahead of the budget by a few weeks and these things are under discussion, so I cannot be too specific about how the budget will turn out or whether the police will be satisfied. The simple fact is that we have to work within constrained circumstances, and whatever budget is finally agreed—I am hopeful that it will be no less generous to the police than budgets have been in the past, given the constraints that we have—it will be for the police and the SPA to work out how to apportion that capital budget.

It might be useful for the committee to hear from Don McGillivray on one or two other points, convener.

There is a strong argument to be made for that, but there is also the argument that we would want to try to improve situations in which human rights abuses have taken place. I think that it would be Police Scotland’s point of view, although it would have to speak for itself in this regard, that, if it could improve the performance of other police forces such that they would take human rights into account, that would be a benefit.

However, you are right to say that there is a reputational issue here, too. I think that Don McGillivray would like to come in on that.

I do not like to start off on a point of disagreement, but the decision to leave the EU was not a decision of the people; it was a decision of the Government. The referendum was advisory; therefore, the decision was taken by the Government, not the people. The decision certainly was not taken by the people of Scotland, who voted 62 per cent against Brexit.

In relation to improvements, you mentioned that capital has been flat over the past 10 years. I will ask Neil Rennick to comment on the Crown Office, whose budget is dealt with separately from the budgets that we have been discussing so far. As there have been flat and reducing capital allocations from Westminster, it is not a surprise that budgets in the Scottish Government’s sphere also feel that pinch.

There are many aspects to how we attempt to address the backlog, and I acknowledge that it is a huge issue for us. The figures that came out last night on the backlog of cases in England and Wales are scary, and I acknowledge that it is also a serious problem for us. This year, we have put in money for technological changes, including remote balloting of juries and remote juries more generally, but those are not the only way in which we intend to deal with the issue.

Neil might want to comment on some of the detail on the Crown Office budget.

Yes. I made the pretty obvious point previously that Covid has not finished with us yet, and we have to continue to take that into account in whatever we do. However, looking beyond Covid, we want to aim at the best suitable system, which is why we are having the review of community justice. I know that the committee will look at that as well. We have to acknowledge that, notwithstanding Covid, we have further to go on the issue. We have to consider how community justice is best dealt with and how it interacts with the national care service, which is important. However, it requires more investment.

Neil Rennick might want to come in on that.

It might be that, as you said, the end-of-days scenario—whoever put that forward—and the estimate of the budget are not where we end up. As I think that we have said already, that will be a process that we go through. It is not only the efforts of the police that need to be funded, but those of other agencies.

I am very willing to say that the police have an extremely difficult job. If they have intelligence or an expectation of a serious threat to public order, you want them there in numbers. If that threat does not transpire, they will, of course, be open to the accusation that they have, if you like, overplayed their hand. I do not think that they can win in those circumstances. I have been going to demonstrations for my entire life. If I was on a demonstration and saw that there were insufficient police numbers to deal with something that happened, I would be critical of the police. Therefore, they need to err on the side of caution; more than that, they need to act on the best intelligence that they have. Who is to say that the two things are not related? Some people who might have been bent on serious disorder—and there was serious intelligence on that—might have seen the police planning that was going on and thought, “No, we are not going to do that.” I will not be the first in line to criticise the police in that regard.

As to the cost, we do not know about that yet. As you suggest, it might come in below what has been suggested, but that would be a good thing. You are right to highlight the number of arrests. We had to estimate that ourselves, because we wanted things such as legal aid cover. That number of arrests has not transpired, and in large part that is due, first of all, to the conduct of protesters and to the engagement between protesters and the police, as well as police planning. Let us not look for failure here. We have three days to go, and a lot could still happen. It has been a very successful event so far.

I want to point out the different challenges that the police face. No previous COP meetings have taken place right in the middle of a relatively small city—they have been on the outskirts of Paris or elsewhere. Therefore, the police have planned effectively to deal with an extremely difficult situation and they have done really well.

Keith Brown has identified an error in his contribution and has provided the following correction.

At col 34, paragraph 6—

Original text—

That is contrary to what I have said, for example, in relation to the three-year funding for the victims fund that we are producing. That funding provides certainty and amounts to around £18 million in its own right.

Corrected text—

That is contrary to what I have said, for example, in relation to the three-year funding for the victims fund that we are producing. That funding provides certainty and amounts to around £30 million in its own right.

We want to have in mind the victims of crimes in relation to community services and the use of remand. If an offender is given a community sentence—that will not be because the Government says so but because a court orders it—an identifiable victim of that crime can have a continuing concern, so we are considering what more we can do to ensure that victims are kept up to date and assurances are given. That also has an interrelationship with things such as electronic monitoring.

Although community justice is often termed “soft justice”, the simple fact is that reconviction rates are lower for people who are put on community sentences. If, as we all agree, we want less crime in society, with fewer people being affected by crime, and fewer victims, we should do what is most effective. In some cases, community sentences are the effective response. I acknowledge that that has been substantially disrupted during Covid. However, we want to make sure of that effectiveness, both through the review of how community justice is currently working, which we are obliged to carry out under the Community Justice (Scotland) Act 2016—you will have seen that the Public Audit Committee has made a number of pretty trenchant observations about what is currently happening—and through considering the relationship with the new national care service, on which a consultation has just finished. All those things play into the fact that community sentencing has a vital role.

Whatever people’s political differences, they have to look seriously at anything that they think can reduce crime and reconviction, and at whether somebody will benefit more from that than they will from being in prison, for example.