Report slams police board expenses

An auditors’ report has heavily criticised the Scottish Police Authority over its expenses policies.

Board members of Scotland’s police watchdog were paid expenses for attending meetings without having to prove they were actually there.

A damning audit of the expenses scheme for the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) reveals a string of lax procedures including board members being paid expenses without providing receipts. Spending watchdog Audit Scotland tested 15 expense claims by board members and found problems with 12 of them.

This included “no process in place for confirming members’ attendance at meetings when claiming for attendance allowance payments”.

Auditors also found board members were claiming different mileage for identical trips, not providing receipts to support claims and using vague descriptions for meetings and journeys.

The SPA was created to hold the country’s new single force Police Scotland to account and has 13 board members paid £300 for every day they work.

No board member has been accused of any wrongdoing and the SPA last night said it has strengthened its expenses policy in light of the Audit Scotland report.

But critics hit out at the police governing body. Scottish Conservative chief whip John Lamont said: “One of the main reasons for creating a single force was to save money.

“Efficiencies that are clearly being made elsewhere, not least the reduction of a frontline presence, risk being completely undermined by a sloppy expenses regime.

“This is taxpayers’ money, and when board members make a claim, it’s important they can show exactly what was claimed for and why.”

Scottish Liberal Democrat justice spokeswoman Alison McInnes MSP said: “This is not a great start for the body which is supposed to ensure accountability in our police. Twelve out of 15 claims for expenses were found to have issues by the Scotland’s independent auditing body. The Scottish Police Authority must act swiftly to tighten up procedures.”

Last year Audit Scotland concluded it was still not clear how Scotland’s new single police force plans to make an expected £1.1 billion of savings by 2026.

The watchdog said in November the SPA and Police Scotland, who have had disputes over how the new policing set-up should be managed, have still to agree a financial strategy showing how savings will be achieved beyond 2013/14,

A spokesman from the Scottish Police Authority said: “In the months leading up to and following April 1 2013, the SPA was rightly focused on delivering a smooth transition from the legacy police organisations to the new structures.

“Last October, Audit Scotland made several recommendations about how we could strengthen our policy covering members’ expenses. Our aim is to be as transparent as possible and therefore we accepted all of the recommendations made.

“We immediately updated our policy and introduced further spot checks as recommended.”