Community-based policing

Community-based policing should be at the heart of any future changes to Scotland's police forces. That was a message I took from my meeting this week with Ayrshire's police commander Bill Fitzpatrick this week ahead of a key Strathclyde Police Authority meeting in the county.

Chief Superintendent Bill Fitzpatrick met me in my role as Police Authority Convener at Kilmarnock Police Office, the Ayrshire divisional headquarters. We discussed the importance of community policing across Ayrshire in a time of budget pressures and potential changes to the number of police forces across Scotland.

Strathclyde Police Authority oversees the £450 million police budget and ensures the force is accountable for policing provided across the west of Scotland. We have an important meeting in Ayr this week that will consider how best to address the looming budget cuts we expect for Strathclyde Police.

It was important to meet up with Chief Superintendent Fitzpatrick to discuss some of the important work police have been doing across Ayrshire before we make some of those decisions.

Community policing has been a key focus for police in this part of Strathclyde which is a mix of towns and rural areas with challenging issues facing the police. This is important as we also consider the future structure of policing across Scotland and potentially reducing the number of forces from eight to three or even one single Scottish force.

This isn't new as people here moved from having an Ayrshire Constabulary in 1975 to merger as part of a larger Strathclyde force. For any change we need to make sure that local autonomy is there for the commander and his officers to respond to calls and incidents where they are needed most, but we also need to ensure that policing remains accountable locally to communities and councils in Ayrshire who fund the service.

We also know there have been real problems in finding room for custody in Ayrshire, which has meant police time wasted taking people who are arrested to cells sometimes more than thirty minutes' drive away often outwith Ayrshire.

The Police Authority has already allocated resources to open new cells in Saltcoats. Having been in Kilmarnock this week, I know that police office also has a pressing need for more custody space which we need to address urgently.

A meeting of the full Authority will take place on Thursday 26 August from 10.30am at South Ayrshire Council headquarters in Ayr. The Authority is formed by 34 locally elected councillors representing the 12 councils that form Strathclyde including North, East and South Ayrshire.