Report Summary
This report provides members of the Scottish Police Authority's Audit, Risk & Assurance Committee with an overview on the oversight of best value across Police Scotland, SPA Forensics and SPA Corporate.
To access the full document please open the PDF document above.
To view as accessible content please use the sections below. (Note that tables and some appendixes are not available as accessible content).
Meeting
The publication discussed was referenced in the meeting below
Audit, Risk and Assurance Committee - 15 August 2024
Date : 15 August 2024
Location : online
Background and detail
The Authority, Chief Constable and Accountable Officer have specific
responsibilities with respect to Best Value.
Audit Scotland and HMICS have independent inspection roles and may choose to undertake an audit of the Authority and Police Scotland’s arrangements for achieving Best Value.
Since the creation of the single national police service there has been no dedicated Best Value audit of policing, however, the Auditor General has now signalled that a Best Value audit of police and fire will be conducted in 2025 at the earliest.
The following paper (appendix A) provides detail of:
• the requirements for Best Value in policing;
• background to the Best Value related audit and inspections to date;
• the approach to demonstrating Best Value across SPA Corporate, Forensic Services and Police Scotland; and
• next steps including Authority’s expectations.
We note that discussions are ongoing between Audit Scotland and HMICS on their planning as well as expectations / guidance for the audit.
At this time, there is no specific policing Best Value guidance. HMICS have noted they intend to work with partners to develop a set of policing-specific expectations for use in future work, to assess whether Best Value is delivered by Police Scotland and the SPA. Until this guidance is available the SPA have adapted the 2020 guidance so that work can commence within Forensic services.
