National Conversation About Our Estate

In the future we will have an estate that... 

• Visibility and presence: Maximises local visibility and presence driving highest possible confidence levels in community policing. 
• Wellbeing focus: Provides significantly improved user experience through fit for purpose workspaces driving smarter working and improved well-being.
• Collaboration: Enables integrated cross-agency services through co-locating with local partners driving better services and cost reduction. 
• Biodiversity consideration: Supports our duty to biodiversity driving reduced environmental impact across all sites and incorporating biodiversity initiatives covering strategic and operational processes. 
• Productive and mobile: Enables our people to be empowered and productive, working from modernised well-serviced workspaces driving digitally-enabled processes, mobility, shared corporate services. 
• Economics optimised: Facilitates maximum income and reciepts to be reinvested from commercial and surplus assets driving enhanced future estate and policing services in local communities. 
• Cultural change: Facilitates co-location within the community driving an embedded service which enables a joint working ethos and ends 'us' and 'them' silos. 
• Commercial innovation: Is financed through commercially innovative approaches e.g. Joint Ventures, Third Party Income and Gain Shares driving best value outcomes and improved policing for local communities. 
• Strong governance: Is supported by a strong central governance framework with appropriate delegation driving aligned and transparent timely decision-making and delivery of estate change programme. 
• Optimised, modernised estate: Provides a smaller, more efficient local operation driving improved responsiveness to community demand, accessible public interface and fit for purpose facilities. 
• Empowers: Empowers Divisional Commanders, within a national governance framework, to design and implement effective estate solutions in a timely manner driving accelerated improvement. 

Our estate transformation will be achieved through working with our local partners, enabling Divisional Commanders to lead the planning of their Divisions. 

In doing so, our Local Policing Divisions will listen, understand and respond to the concerns of communities, partners, and colleagues. 

No, this is part of the delivery of our Estate Strategy which was approved in 2019 by the Scottish Police Authority.

Policing should be responsive to current and future needs and part of this is ensuring we have our staff located in the areas where they are needed most. Centralisation of services has played no part in our decision making process when we have identified which offices should be considered for disposal.

Police Scotland inherited a large estate which was based on legacy arrangements.  This estate was developed over a significant period of time when demands on policing were very different from current and anticipated future demands.

The demands facing policing and the public expectation of policing in Scotland has evolved over time and will continue to evolve, however the estate which is crucial to the delivery of policing services, has not evolved and has largely remained as is. 

We are proposing to dispose of the stations highlighted. The review was done at a local level with divisional commanders and looked at a number of factors including local demand and where local resources could be located to continue to provide policing services.

We understand and are sensitive to community concerns around changes involving police buildings and as we bring forward proposals we will engage and consult with the public.

Local engagement will be based on an assessment of the impacts of the service change to the public and local community and will be developed with Divisional Commanders – and with consideration of Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act. 

At the heart of our proposal is the desire to meet the needs of our communities and ensure that we have our staff located in the right locations. The review of the Police Scotland estate was conducted to ensure that the estate is fit for purpose and reflects the changing nature of policing and can support service delivery to local communities. That being said, hard choices are being taken to deliver effective policing within the revenue budget available to us and we are now accelerating plans to dispose of a number of police stations across the country.

In a challenging financial time we have to give consideration to reducing unnecessary expenditure. The majority of the stations being considered for disposal are not fit for purpose and have significant running costs. This is not a sustainable position.

Police Scotland has 309 sites, consisting of 329 buildings, of which 306 buildings are operational police stations.

Many operational stations are in disrepair, are not open to the public or have low levels of public use, and some have very few officers and/or staff based in them.

The number of staff/officers affected by the proposed closures is around 2,500. This includes police staff and functions such as Criminal Justice, Specialist Crime, Operational Support, local policing response teams and community policing teams.

When reviewing their estate, each Division considered a number of factors including the demand for service from relevant locations and where resources need to be deployed from to enhance service delivery. We have identified that many of our buildings no longer meet current operational requirements.

The premises considered for disposal or lease termination which are currently occupied are outlined on this page. 

We will consult with Trade Unions and staff to understand the proposed moves and what it might mean for them.  Similar engagement will be held with statutory staff associations for operational staff.

At this time, no decision has been made on what will happen to buildings considered for disposal. This will form part of our engagement process with partners and our communities.

Like many organisations, the way the public interacts with us has changed with the majority of requests for service coming to us via the telephone rather than by visiting a police station. It is important that we locate our staff in the areas where they are needed most. While reviewing our current estate, we have considered the level of service that is required at each location and the anticipated demand.

We have already introduced technology that enables our officers to remain in local areas, reducing the need for them to return to police stations to deal with paperwork.

We are committed to maintaining a presence within our local communities, through police officers being able to patrol and respond to community needs. There are a range of alternative approaches we can consider to meet the needs of our different communities.

No. The review of our estate is driven by a desire to meet the needs of our communities and ensure that we have our staff located in the areas where they are needed most. Like many organisations, the way the public interacts with us has changed with the majority of requests for service coming to us via the telephone rather than by visiting a police office. We are committed to maintaining a presence within our local communities, through police officers being able to patrol and respond to community needs.

Our strategy seeks to move towards police stations co-located with partners where possible, to ensure services are delivered in the most efficient and effective way, driving improved integrated services to the public, particularly prioritising those most vulnerable.

We now have more than 60 co-locations with partners, providing more sustainable, more modern, and safer workspaces for our people.

We have great examples of successful partnerships in the North East, Perthshire, Forth Valley, and Ayrshire among others and this will continue to be an important part of ensuring policing in Scotland is sustainable.

Taking every opportunity to co-locate with partners is not only the best way to deliver savings to the public purse, it also facilitates more integrated and effective public services with better outcomes, particularly for the vulnerable in our society.

The 30 properties previously communicated were part of a particular project, Project Falcon, however we also had other properties that Police Scotland is in the process of disposing that sit outside the scope of Project Falcon. In order to ensure transparency and avoid any confusion we are telling our officers, staff and the public about our wider plans for changing our estate. It has been agreed that all estates disposals currently planned are brought together within one project group which will deliver on this aspect of the estate strategy.

We are proposing the disposal of 59 police buildings over the next three years. Of these buildings:

• 29 will now be going out for community and officers and staff engagement and consultation – these are the buildings we announced recently that would be coming forward for disposal.
• 16 will be 'business-as-usual' disposals – all are either long term vacant or vacant because of a move to a new site which has already taken place. We will also be consulting on them through this platform.
• 14 will be from future Estates Transformation projects which will see plans brought forward for Scottish Police Authority approval in due course. We will also be consulting on these changes through this platform.

We continuously review our estate as part of our normal business and this will continue. This includes considering opportunities for new ways of working with partners and assessing issues with the current estate that are no longer manageable. As part of this work, we may identify properties that are considered surplus and appropriate engagement and consultation is undertaken.   

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