Scottish Police Authority chair Andrew Flanagan doesn't pull any punches with governance review

The hard-hitting nature of Andrew Flanagan’s review of police governance, which was published this week, is not immediately obvious when scanning the 30 recommendations laid out by the Scottish Police Authority chair.

Rather, it is his ‘personal commentary’ that leaps off the page: there has been a “paucity of financial information provided to the SPA” by Police Scotland, which has “typically been delivered both late and at a highly summarised level”; the responsibility of the SPA for holding the chief constable to account is “ill-defined and open to interpretation”; and an “overriding perception” exists that local communities “are not being listened to and that local commanders do not have enough autonomy to make local decisions”.

Given the Scottish Government’s decision to ask Flanagan to conduct the ‘rapid’ review upon his appointment last September - rather than bring someone outwith the scrutiny bubble in - the former NSPCC chief executive was always going to face a tricky task. Not only would he have to deliver a candid assessment of what needed to change, it had to be perceived as such.

As his foreword makes clear, this report is “very much a stepping stone” – everyone, after all, needs to actually act on the recommendations – but it certainly doesn’t shy away from what has went wrong and what needs to change.

First up, localism and community accountability. “A number of issues arose, including stop and search, armed officers, closure of police offices and traffic wardens, which created a feeling that the policing needs and desires of local communities were being overridden in the search for standardisation and efficiencies,” said his report.

“It can be argued that some of these issues were driven by the desire of Police Scotland to improve the quality of service and indeed provide equity of service. However, the overriding perception has been that local communities are not being listened to and that local commanders do not have enough autonomy to make local decisions.”

There was a “sense of frustration” that there is no clear route to challenge policing policy decisions that run contrary to local views, he added. Local commanders should be given “more autonomy on how policies and practices are implemented”, Flanagan urged, while “greater consideration needs to be given to the differing policing needs of local communities”.

A formal escalation process is also required that means major policy issues are “resolved at senior officer level within Police Scotland rather than at local commander level”.

Such calls to improve local engagement left local government umbrella body COSLA “encouraged”, spokesperson for community wellbeing Councillor Harry McGuigan said.

“The Act gives a role to both local government and the SPA in holding Police Scotland to account and, as the layer of governance closest to communities, councils should be treated with the esteem they deserve,” added McGuigan. “The bottom line is that robust and meaningful scrutiny by councils on behalf of local communities will help us move from the crisis management approach we have seen to date and, ultimately, improve policing.”

Next on Flanagan’s list was the structure of the police authority itself. A number of skills are “under-represented or missing as the SPA develops its governance role” (the SPA today launched a recruitment drive for new members) while “confusion” exists over which matters should be considered either in public or private (Flanagan suggests the full board meeting be public and committee meetings take place behind closed doors, which I would expect union reps to have reservations about).

It is his assessment of efforts to balance ‘operational independence’ with ‘policing by consent’ that is telling, however.

“In my view, the SPA sits at this crossroad and has responsibility to reflect the public consent on police policy and procedures. This should not merely be a reactive oversight once an issue has come to the attention of the public but a proactive approach which seeks to avert concerns. At present, we do not have an approach or the capability to do this.”

Equally, the SPA has not yet set out a framework nor the measures against which the chief constable will be held to account. “Without a benchmark of expected performance, it is very difficult to establish accountability,” said Flanagan.

On the sharing of information, reports presented to the SPA are “often based on what can be measured rather than what should be measured, and the causal link between policing and results is not clear”.

Systems used to generate data are often still ones inherited from legacy forces. “While I would not expect systems and processes to be rationalised overnight, especially in the context of a merger of nine different organisations, I would have expected more progress on the effective management and use of information than appears to have been achieved,” said Flanagan.

As such, the authority chair goes on to call for a “complete review of the information and reporting requirements of both Police Scotland and the SPA”.

There is therefore a lot to deliver in rather short timescales. Police Scotland chief superintendent Andrew Morris stressed the force is “committed to working with the SPA to enhance the effectiveness and local accountability of policing across Scotland”, while the Scottish Government said the report will be “considered carefully” before a full response is published later in the year.

For now, at least, Flanagan appears to have taken a first step in tackling the “toothless tiger” characterisation which followed the Scottish Police Authority around for much of its first three years.