Volunteering Groups

Volunteering across Police Scotland comprises of three groups, those being SCs, the PSYV, and Additionality Volunteers, as outlined below.

Special Constables

In January 2021, an internal Volunteering Strategic Overview (Appendix A) was presented and approved by the Service, with the following three key priorities:

Expand capacity and skills in line with policing demands – Expand the impact of volunteers by developing a response that is skilled, capable, empowered and aligned to local and national policing priorities.

Modernise and evolve – Develop a modern volunteering service that is flexible and adaptable and can evolve to meet the needs of policing challenges now and in the future.

Value, empower and trust – Create a positive working environment where volunteers are valued, supported and enabled to serve Scottish communities

Early considerations were around the potential to grow the Special Constabulary by almost double over three years, however, with the advent of the pandemic, coupled with significant policing operations, including COP26, ambitions were recalibrated and resources in the Volunteering Coordination Unit (VCU) aligned accordingly.

Additionally, the impact of the Pension Remedy in 2022, caused the Service to prioritise the recruitment of regular officers, thereby reducing resource to facilitate Special Constabulary applications.

Additionally, the impact of the Pension Remedy in 2022, caused the Service to prioritise the recruitment of regular officers, thereby reducing resource to facilitate Special Constabulary applications.

Despite these factors, a number of key aspects of the Delivery Plan (Appendix B) are being delivered and the year-on-year attrition of Special Constables has been slowed significantly and stabilised. Governance structures are in place to ensure we capture the work ongoing and the deliverables from the delivery plan. (Appendix C)

Structures are now in place to peer support applications and a focus on Employee Supported Policing (ESP). ESP events are regularly taking place across the country, with a number of officers recruited and supported through this more targeted method.

ESP is a partnership between an organisation and Police Scotland. It enables an organisation to grant their employee some paid days/hours to volunteer as a Special Constable at Police Scotland – typically 5 - 10 days a year. Many of Scotland’s local councils are signing up to ESP and supporting their employees.

ESP tends to attract ‘career Special Constables’, those that want to give back to their own community for a number of years, providing a capable and consistent local resource of valued volunteers in their communities.

Our Special Constables work is highlighted in a quarterly newsletter (Appendix D), which highlights individual case studies of officers working in their communities and also showcases good practice nationally. Some recent regional activity is below –

West – A Special Constable based in Ayrshire Division co-ordinates specific deployments aligned to local policing priorities in Ayrshire. He has developed his road policing knowledge including leading Quad Bike patrols on the busy beaches of the west coast alongside other Special Constables and representing Police Scotland at Community Safety Events.

East – #NEST (North East Support Team) is a pro-active group of Special Constables based within Community Policing in E Division who also work cross border with J Division SC colleagues. SCs within NEST are mentored and trained to become an independent resource targeting local priorities. #NEST feature on national social media and are influencing other divisions with cross divisional working.

North - Special Constables Kelman and Stewart are employees of Perth and Kinross Council and held a Special Constables recruitment event at Perth and Kinross Headquarters. The session was to promote Employer Supported Policing (ESP) which Perth and Kinross support. SC Kelman and Stewart spoke with potential applicants by using their personal insights into the role, their experiences and how they achieve balance taking duties alongside their work/personal life commitments.

North - Shetland has 4 Special Constables with 3 carrying out a very unique role as Drug Dog Handlers. The officers full time role are as part of the ‘Dogs Against Drugs’ which is a Registered Scottish charity and community led project started in 2002 by the community, in an effort to help to safeguard the islands from the issue of illegal drugs. The officers are all serving Special Constables who use their warranted position to have the dogs trained and deployed as police dogs

Police Scotland Youth Volunteers

As outlined above, PSYV was established in 2014 with the purpose of giving young people of all backgrounds and the service a positive meaningful way of engagement with local communities.

The stated aim at this time was
To deepen police engagement with young people, breaking down barriers with traditionally difficult to engage communities and promoting positive role models.

The objectives of PSYV are

promote a practical understanding of policing amongst all young people;
encourage the spirit of adventure and good citizenship;
support local policing priorities through volunteering;
give young people a chance to be heard; and
Inspire young people to participate positively in their communities.

Through regular training and participation in community safety initiatives, youth volunteers are given opportunities to overcome barriers and discover their talents whilst making a positive contribution to their communities.
The programme has recovered well after Covid, growing rapidly and has a national governance structure in place as business as usual.

Police Scotland Youth Volunteers aim to recruit 25% of their Youth Volunteers from vulnerable backgrounds. This is an area in which PSYV have been very successful and received continued support and funding from the Scottish Government (Violence Reduction Unit). Current funding equates to approximately £80,000 annually, down from a high of £120,000 over the first years of PSYV. (Appendix E)

Each group has autonomy to meet their local community’s needs and the PSYV delivers training to its volunteers in order to meet the identified needs and meet Policing priorities aligned to the Police Scotland Annual Policing Plan. By meeting these objectives this enhances safer communities and builds trust and confidence. In doing this we ensure that our priority of reducing violence is met.

Acknowledging the benefits of peer education and working in collaboration with partners the service has delivered Peer Education awards for our PSYV. There are two levels, being educated and then being an educator. An example of this being a group arranging an 8 week programme, organised and delivered by our youth volunteers on water safety to local community groups.

PSYV has also been identified internationally and this year we have been invited by a similarly aligned organisation, Bluelight New Zealand, to attend a Leadership and Development course along with youths from Australia and USA. Bluelight NZ are keen to understand how we support local policing priorities through volunteering and wish to develop some of their future strategies and programmes based on our PSYV volunteering model. We are will also seek reciprocal learning around the prevention and intervention work they conduct with young people through outdoor education and intervention programmes, with the potential to replicate these programmes in Scotland and a similar international event.

On June 10th 2023 we are bringing our ‘kilted kiwis’ together at the Scottish Police College for a national ‘Braveheart’ event along with over a 100 youths from our groups nationally. Some other recent regional activity is below –

North – Aberdeen / North Aberdeenshire participated in the national campaign of proxy buying of alcohol “It will Cost You” by visiting all Off licenses in their area and distributing posters and highlighting the campaign through engagement and educating the general public.
East - Dunfermline PSYV have deployed in areas identified as speeding concerns under Community Speed Watch –PSYV would safely deploy signage encouraging drivers to adhere to speed limits.
The 150th Open was held at the old course St Andrews and numerous PSYV Groups supported this large scale event throughout the competition days.
West – Glasgow PSYV Groups have distributed leaflets to elderly/ vulnerable residents in relation to Bogus Work People/Scammers, as well as distributing leaflets to students within the city.
Volunteering Groups

Additionality Volunteers

The service has always looked to our own staff who take on additional voluntary work both within the organisation, e.g. Well-being and Veterans Champions, and externally, e.g. RNLI and Army reservists. By supporting our own staff to undertake these additional responsibilities this strengthens our own commitment to public service and strengthens the link with local communities.

Cognisant that a number of officers have recently retired from the service, we have actively looked to offer these officers the chance to remain as Special Constables whilst also retaining some of their experience.

We are working to expand this model and streamline the process to welcome retired officers’ back, who may not wish to become a Special, but remain committed to contribute to the service and Scotland in any way that suits them and us. This work is at an early stage of consideration and engagement with key partners, including Staff Associations and Trade Unions will take place to inform our thinking.