Scottish Police Federation says officers buying equipment from charity shops

Police officers are buying equipment from charity shops because of funding cuts, a senior figure in a police professional body has claimed.

Calum Steele, general secretary of the Scottish Police Federation (SPF), highlighted the problem in a Twitter post. 

He Tweeted: “Police officers being sent to charity shops to source basic equipment for policing is shameful - is happening & desperate sign of lack of £”.

Steele told Holyrood that the case involved an officer who had wanted to buy a sunblind for a police vehicle that was carrying a child.

He said that a more senior officer had told the SPF member to go out and buy the blind when they asked for one to protect the child passenger.

Steele said that there had been other cases where officers had bought goods they needed to do their job from charity shops, but claimed that this one had been the “straw that broke the camel’s back”.