Background

2024 marks 70 years in Police Officer training at the Scottish Police College and coincidently 24/25 will also mark the largest number of new recruits joining Police Scotland since its inception.

Careful consideration is given to the number and frequency of officers leaving Police Scotland. Early projection for those leaving in 24/25 was estimated at 63 per month. This has risen to an estimated average projection of around 80 officers leaving per month. The vast majority of those officers are retiring from police service. The increased retirements are largely as a direct consequence of the McCloud Remedy introduced in 2022 providing officers with an option to retire at the age of 50 years with 25 years police service.

The strategic recruitment and training pause in December 2023 was entirely predicated on a lack of available revenue funding and whilst it has allowed for the exploration of a revised recruitment model, developed and agreed, it has had a detrimental impact on both officer recruitment and training.

The revised model for recruitment of police officers has provided the ability to increase numbers and do so in a flexible way that is demand led. This model moves away from the traditional quarterly intakes of approximately 200 recruits to a more frequent model, introduced in March 2024 and will accommodate ten intakes of officers per year.

Organisation learning has been gleaned from a number of sources including Operation Tarn, Human Rights Baseline review, HMICS Review of Culture, Manchester Arena Inquiry, HMICS Crime Audit, HMICS Review of the Contact Assessment Model (CAM). Violence Against Women and Girls and equality, diversity and inclusion training, and trauma informed and wellbeing training.
As such a thematic review of all training delivered by LTD is underway, with Initial Probationer Training identified as a priority.