Police Scotland Commander Confirms No Return of Direct Phone Lines to Local Stations

by Peter Urpeth, Local Democracy Reporter
The newly appointed Commander of Police Scotland in the Western Isles, CI Ross McCartney, has confirmed there will be no return of direct phone lines to local police stations, saying, “that’s not something we’re going to go back to.”
The Commander’s comments came after two councillors on Comhairle nan Eilean Siar’s Community Safety Board raised concerns about recent issues problems they had encountered contacting police, with one, Loch a’ Tuath Cllr Calum MacLean claiming, “it would be easier to actually get into Barlinnie [Prison] than to actually contact the police in Stornoway.” 
Local councillor Kenneth MacLean raised a recent issue on Barra when he had tried to contact police but felt at the time it was not appropriate to use the 999 emergency line to report the incident.
He suggested that the return of local phone contact with the police could be “…even just for officials like ourselves, or people in the NHS who need to contact the police for any sort of incidents that might be better handled in a more subtle fashion.”
Loch a’ Tuath councillor, Calum Maclean, said he knew of a recent incident in which an individual had tried to contact local police after he found a man having a heart attack at the roadside and, allegedly, being unable to contact emergency ambulance services he’d called the police, and his call was routed to the Dundee call centre.
Cllr Calum Maclean added:
“…by the time he would have given every answer to what he [was asked on the phone], the poor man would have probably died. So he took him into his own wagon and took him to the hospital.”
Cllr Calum MacLean also said that people had also experienced delays in reporting anti-social behaviour, and this was impacting reported cases, stating:
“…we used to be able to walk into the police station. We used to phone the police station, and we would have a cop out very, very, quickly. We can’t get that now. And it’s really a means of people not reporting. 
“…we’ve moved into this era of high tech or whatever, but it’s very low tech when you can’t get a police officer when you want one.”
In response, CI McCartney stated:
“Unfortunately, [putting] lines back into police stations is not something that is going to happen, and that’s purely because we’ve moved to online now. So fixed phones in stations are a thing in the past.
“I think we have one in each station purely from a point of resilience and business continuity, should we need it, so we’re not wholly reliant online.
“However, because of our command-and-control system, when you phone the police, all calls go through that risk and harm assessment – who is involved in [the incident]? What is it? So that if we are responding to it, we are sending officers into a fully briefed incident, so they know. 
“…In relation to other services, NHS, and stuff, we obviously have our service centres that the area control rooms, fire control, Scottish Ambulance control, can actually patch a direct number through to our Dundee-based area control room, and a call will be logged as an incident with local officers.”
CI McCartney added that there was a pro-forma contact section on the police Scotland website which, he said, was “straightforward and relatively easy,” to use, and added:
“…what that does is that it populates direct to the area control room, so the person that’s the submitter no longer has to sit for an hour, and that’ll come through, and then it’ll be logged, there as a call, and it’ll come out to local officers.” ‌​‌​‌​​​‍‌​‌​​‌‌‌‍‌​‌‌​​‌​‍‌​‌‌‌​‌‌‍‌​‌‌‌‌​​

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