Official Report · Chamber
Portfolio Question Time
This is the draft Official Report. The final version may differ.
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To ask the Scottish Government what plans it has to increase funding for policing and community safety initiatives in rural areas, in light of recent data indicating upward trends in criminality in Dumfries and Galloway. (S7O-00229)
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Police and police staff play a vital role in keeping our communities safe, which is why we are investing record funding of more than £1.7 billion in policing in 2026-27.
Although decisions on the deployment of officers and staff, operational policing priorities and the allocation of resources across local areas are matters for the chief constable, Police Scotland continues to place significant emphasis on community policing and engagement with local communities, including in rural areas such as the member’s.
As is set out in Police Scotland’s 2030 vision and three-year business plan, community policing remains central to keeping people safe, and our record investment is ensuring that Police Scotland has the resources that it needs to respond to local demands across the country.
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Overall crime rates in my local policing division have hit 552 per 10,000 residents, which is 3.5 per cent higher than in the previous year. In 2023, police numbers in Dumfries and Galloway were the lowest in Scotland, but, in recent weeks, local officers, led by chief superintendent Claire Dobson, have been touring towns and villages with a recruitment van to generate a pipeline of new officers, and I commend them for that positive and visible initiative.
Does the minister accept that it is more difficult to recruit officers in rural areas? What more can the Scottish Government do to support Police Scotland, both financially and practically, as it seeks to attract new recruits in hard-to-hire areas such as Dumfries and Galloway?
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I am grateful to Craig Hoy for his focus on the importance of police officer numbers. Of course, we have more officers per head of population in Scotland than there are in England and Wales. Our officers also receive the best basic pay in the United Kingdom at the minimum and maximum of each rank, which is really important when we think of recruitment decisions.
Our record investment in policing continues to allow Police Scotland to recruit new officers, with more than 160 new recruits in July 2026 and further recruitment planned throughout the year. Police Scotland has confirmed that there is a healthy recruitment pipeline. I commend Craig Hoy for his focus on and support for Police Scotland as it goes about the important work of ensuring that we have a proper pipeline of recruitment in place.
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In recent months, there has been a worrying rise in the number of reported incidents of vandalism across my constituency. In Tain, a high street shop and the much-loved rose garden suffered significant damage. In Thurso, homes and cars were vandalised and even the entrance of Thurso police station was targeted. What action will the minister take to ensure that local officers have the resources that they need to tackle such crimes? Will she heed calls from across the Highlands to restore the local control that was lost following the centralisation of policing?
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It is really important that policing has a local focus in more rural areas, as the member has described. Rural crime can impact on individuals, communities and businesses, which is why the local focus that Police Scotland has is so vital as it goes about its business.
There is also the focus of the Scottish Partnership Against Rural Crime, known as SPARC. That organisation is chaired by Police Scotland and brings together key justice, enforcement and rural sector partners to ensure that there is a co-ordinated, multi-agency approach to preventing and reducing crime in more rural areas. SPARC also supports intelligence gathering and enforcement, in order that there is practical crime prevention activity taking place in communities such as the member’s.
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I will take a brief supplementary question from Jamie Langan.
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Would the minister concede that the closure of more than 200 police stations has disproportionately affected public safety in rural areas such as the Scottish Borders and South Lanarkshire?
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Police Scotland’s important focus on making its own operational decisions so that the chief constable is able to determine where and how best to deploy officers is central to both preventing and detecting crime. In all localities, significant partnership working is going on between partners and Police Scotland, which ensures that we have a local focus while appreciating that deployment is a matter for the chief constable.
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