Report Summary
The Scottish Police Authority attended the Criminal Justice Committee on Wednesday 30 October 2024 to give evidence as part of its pre-budget scrutiny. The Authority submitted written evidence in advance setting out the context for the policing budget and the challenges and requirements for the years ahead. This aimed to support Committee Members’ questioning on the day.
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Revenue
The Scottish Police Authority set a revenue budget of £1,418.7 million for 2024/25. An additional 4.2% (£59.1m) of revenue funding is requested for 2025/26.
This requirement would allow policing to maintain our overall workforce numbers, including up to 16,600 police officers. It will also address inflationary pressures that cannot be mitigated by savings, and meet a pay award aligned with the public sector pay strategy. Crucially, this would also support the continued reform of policing as outlined in Police Scotland’s vision and 3-year business plan.
This revenue request incorporates additional funding required for proposed legislative change which will impact on policing, for example the Domestic Abuse (Protection) (Scotland) Act 2021 and the Police (Ethics, Conduct and Scrutiny) (Scotland) Bill.
In the event of a flat cash revenue settlement in 2025/26, policing would need to reduce its workforce headcount, across police officers and police staff, to achieve full year savings equivalent to approximately 1,300 people. This would require a freeze on officer recruitment and a staff exit programme. With such a large workforce reduction, there would be an inevitable impact on the service that policing would be able to deliver.
