Extra police should be out on the beat - not replacing police staffs

Wed 16 May 2012


Survey by UNISON indicates half of extra officers are covering non-operational duties
Up to half of the 1000 extra police recruited by the Scottish Government are spending some or all of their time doing the work previously carried out by police staffs who have been made redundant. That’s the result of a survey by UNISON, the union representing police staffs ahead of Thursday’s parliamentary debate on policing.

Police forces across Scotland have been trying to make savings. As the Scottish Government has an arbitrary target to maintain police officer numbers at 17234, the focus of the savings are concentrated on police staffs. This has resulted in over 1000 police staff posts being lost. As a consequence police officers are taking on the work of police staffs.

Police staffs operate in corporate and support roles in functions such as intelligence, information technology, control rooms, station assistants, forensics and human resources. They also take on operational roles in areas such as custody and detention, financial investigation and scenes of crime.

It is very difficult to precisely specify the amount of job substitution because most of the duties are spread among a larger group of police officers who often spend only part of their time undertaking these duties. To get a better picture UNISON Scotland undertook a survey of a random sample of UNISON members employed in police boards in Scotland.

This survey shows that around 53% of the 1000 police staff posts which have already gone are being covered in part or in full by police officers. That means around 500 police officers are now not out on the street fighting crime for part of the time they used to be.

If this was applied to the future staffing plan it would suggest up to 2,000 officers could, at least in part, be taken off operational duties. UNISON accepts that extrapolation from survey data is not a precise calculation. But it does give an indication of the scale of loss – one police officer lost in this way would be too many. And remember - we already have hundreds of police officers undertaking roles that elsewhere in the UK would be done more efficiently by police staffs.

George McIrvine, Chair of UNISON Scotland’s Police Staffs Committee said:
“People expect police to be out on the beat - not doing jobs that, quite frankly, other people are better qualified for. It’s also pretty galling for staff to see people made redundant to save money being replaced by uniformed Officers earning nearly double the wages of those who’ve gone out the door."

UNISON Scotland Head of Bargaining and Campaigns Dave Watson said:
“The fixation on maintaining numbers of uniformed officers while slashing budgets everywhere else wastes money and does nothing to keep people safe. Scottish police forces are already less specialised with lower levels of civilianisation than those in England. If current trends are carried on into the proposed single police force we will see anything up to 2000 police officers spending some or all of their time off operational duties. It’s the wrong approach in terms of public safety - and makes no sense economically”


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New UNISON study argues for proper service redesign instead of back office cuts through flawed 'shared service' models

Tuesday 20 March 2012


The front line starts here

A new 16-page report for UNISON Scotland argues that 'efficiency savings' which are often expected from piecemeal organisational change such as flawed 'shared services' models are rarely achieved. In fact, the vast majority of front line staff - around 90% - who have faced cuts to so-called 'back office' admin jobs believe this has been at the expense of their primary tasks.

'The front line starts here' document, published today, outlines the case for full service redesign to be explored as an option when developing shared front and back office service proposals.

Dave Watson, Head of Bargaining and Campaigns, said:
"The UK National Audit Office reported this month that Whitehall departments have spent a staggering £1.4 billion over the past seven years - but saved just £159 million by ill-advised schemes for sharing 'back office' functions such as personnel and procurement.

"Our report highlights the importance of designing systems from the service user upwards - as opposed to piecemeal organisational change in the form of structures, which is resulting in the separation and fragmentation of services across the Scottish public sector.

"We want to end that kind of waste. Instead we want to work with public authorities to explore full service redesign as an option when developing shared front and back office service proposals."

The new report includes results from a UNISON survey of frontline public service worker in areas like social work and protective services, which shows that cutbacks in admin functions have damaging effects on vital public service, and are rarely effective or efficient.

Dave Watson said:
"The vast majority of the front line workers we surveyed - 94% - believed that it was more effective to provide administrative support in the same office than to centralise in 'shared service' type back office operations. 'The front line starts here' seeks to expose the flaws in creating artificial splits between the front and back office services when setting up shared service delivery arrangements, as back and front office services are interdependent."

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Note to editors:

1. UNISON is Scotland’s largest trade union representing over 160,000 members working in the public sector in Scotland. Our members work together in the teams providing vital public services for all our communities - whether they are regarded as 'frontline' or 'back office'.

2. 'The front line starts here' was prepared for UNISON Scotland by APSE – the Association for Public Service Excellence (Scotland) - and is available for download here:
www.unison-scotland.org.uk/publicworks/ thefrontlinestartshere_mar2012.pdf 

3. Results of UNISON Scotland survey 2011 included in 'The front line starts here' document:

In 2011 UNISON Scotland surveyed a sample of ‘front office’ staff on administrative support. Primarily professional staff in local government such as social work, planning, protective services etc. The key findings included:

• 87% reported that their administrative staff support had been reduced.

• 92% of those using replacement selfservice systems felt that this had added to their workload at the expense of their primary tasks.

• 84% indicated that they were being expected to perform clerical or administrative tasks that used to be performed by staff trained to perform those functions.

• Of those who were undertaking additional administrative tasks:

- 26% said up to 2 hours per week
- 24% said between 2-4 hours per week
- 37% said between 4-7 hours per week
- 13% said more than one day per week

• 94% believed that it was more effective to provide administrative support in the same office than to centralise in back office operations.


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We are frontline NHS events 5 July

A new video has been launched publicising events at hospitals across Scotland to say "Who do you think you are kidding mR Cameron - we are frontline". See the video at http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/

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