Police chiefs in junket to discuss cutbacks

POLICE chiefs have been criticised for spending thousands on an overnight stay at a country club hotel in order to discuss swingeing cuts to the force’s budget.

Eight senior officers from Lothian and Borders Police, which has to reduce its budget by around £43 million, stayed at a four-star hotel just ten miles from police headquarters.

Yesterday the decision to splash out £2,000 for an overnight stay at the Marriott Dalmahoy Hotel and Country Club was described as “outrageous”.

Matthew Elliott, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance said: “Police chiefs absolutely shouldn’t be wasting money on hiring luxury hotels for a conference when they can use their own headquarters, already paid for by taxpayers.

“It’s outrageous that top officers needlessly blew so much cash on fine dining and stayed the night when they should have been discussing savings.

“This shows that senior officers have not accepted that they need to make savings; taxpayers will wonder how chiefs could be so blasé with taxpayers’ money whilst pleading poverty.”

The Dalmahoy is described as a luxury, four-star hotel a baronial mansion with “breathtaking scenery, incredible sunsets and views of Edinburgh Castle”.

Surrounded by 1,000 acres of parkland, the hotel has a leisure retreat, two 18-hole golf courses, a PGA-approved golf academy, gym, indoor swimming pool, spa, tennis and an award- winning restaurant.

It is believed Chief Constable David Strang, Deputy Chief Constable Steve Allen, and Assistant Chief Constables Iain Livingstone and Bill Skelly were joined at the Dalmahoy by director of resources Peter Thickett and Susan Mitchell – head of the force’s “Transforming The Service” cost-cutting drive.

The officers enjoyed a three-course dinner before spending the night at the hotel before using the conference suite at the hotel the following day for talks, despite having newly decorated conference rooms back at force headquarters at Fettes in Edinburgh.

A police spokesman said: “We can confirm that eight members of the force stayed away overnight at a hotel in the force area to allow for an extended meeting to agree how to take the force through significant challenges of the police reform programme.” Lothian and Borders Police have already made £19.7 million in “efficiency savings” in the past three years and must find “significant future savings” as part of their Transforming The Service programme.

Police in Scotland are to be merged into a single national force under Scottish Government plans. A draft business case for the government reported in August that a single force would cost around £207m to deliver over five years, but save £390m during that time. Over 15 years around £1.9 billion would be saved.

A spokesman for the Scottish Conservatives said police chiefs should reconsider their priorities: “The public will be astonished at stories like this at a time when everyone is having to tighten their belts.

“They will want to make sure that the taxes they pay for the police to keep them safe are being spent in the right way. The priority has to be safety and public security.”

Labour MSP James Kelly also criticised the jaunt. He said: This will raise a lot of eyebrows and prompt a lot of questions. With significant cuts coming down the line, the SNP need to get a grip of this kind of spending. You don’t need a luxury resort to make good decisions.”

An SNP spokeswoman said there was no room for complacency, before adding: “We expect people to be responsible with taxpayers’ money in these difficult times.”

The Association of Chief Police Officers of Scotland declined to comment, saying the issue was a matter for individual forces and their respective police boards.