Crime down 40% but staffing up a wee bit – Police Officers trade union praises SNP Government?

By Professor John Robertson

Crime in Scotland per 10 000 people, at the end of 10 years of Labour rule in Scotland

Crime in Scotland per 10 000 people, at the end of 17 years of SNP rule in Scotland, 40.5% down.

40.5% less crime? We must need fewer police officers then? That’s what the Tories or Starmerites would do. It’s not personal, just business.

Did the SNP do that?

Nope.

From Police Scotland data, today:

Scotland’s Chief Statistician has published statistics on Police Officer Quarterly Strength, which gives the number of full-time equivalent police officers employed by Police Scotland.

The key findings of the statistics are:

  • there were 16,356 full-time equivalent (FTE) police officers in Scotland on 31 March 2024
  • police officer numbers decreased by 7 FTE officers (<0.1%) in the last quarter from 31 December 2023
  • police officer numbers decreased by 259 FTE officers (-1.6%) in the last year from 31 March 2023
  • this is an increase of 122 FTE police officers (+0.7%) from the 16,234 FTE police officers recorded at 31 March 2007

So, crime down 40% but staffing up a wee bit. Police Officers trade union praises SNP Government? Aye right!

2 thoughts on “Crime down 40% but staffing up a wee bit – Police Officers trade union praises SNP Government?”

  2. O/T

    Tory MP Natalie Elphicke has crossed over, as in defected, to the Labour party……

    If you do not know who she is then she was the former wife of Tory MP Charlie Elphicke, who was jailed for sexual assault in 2020, so she then stood in the same seat as her husband once had when he stood down as the MP for that area after he was charged with three counts of sexual assault against two women …..and she was then elected in 2019 as the new Tory MP for Dover…..blue rosette obviously won that election….

    She spoke out in support of her then husband’s appeal against the conviction and sentencing, where she said she knew he had “behaved badly” (hardly an appropriate description for behaviour via sexual assaults on two women)…..she thought the sentence was “excessive” and criticised the court as being “on a bit of a mission”….obviously she assumed the rules for Tories and rules for others, had this time, not been complied with via the Court system.

    In July 2021, she was one of five MPs found to have breached their code of conduct by the Commons select Committee on standards for “attempting to influence senior judges in November 2020 in her husband’s sentencing appeal after his conviction for sexual assault”……The committee recommended that Elphicke and two other MPs receive a one-day suspension from parliament. She apologised for her actions….and only got a slap on the wrist kind of punishment….for a serious action taken by her !

    However there is more to her….indeed one could describe her as being ‘from the same mould’ as both former Tory MP, 30p Lee , who was another defector , but not to the Labour party…as he has been there already pre Tory party, but to The Reform UK party and also she is similar to the hideous current Tory MP Jonathan Gullis….via some of the same kind of rhetoric and lack of compassion and empathy for others less fortunate in the world that has been spewed out by all three of them….

    Natalie’s speciality is ‘doing a Farage’ in bemoaning ‘Migrants in boats’ where she has been known to indulge in participating in a ‘Migrant watch’ at Dover….She supported the government’s controversial Rwanda plan to permanently deport asylum seekers to the central African country……she was also heckled by P & O staff, as being one of the Tory MP’s who voted for the employment law that allowed the fire & rehire of staff, during a protest at Dover when Ferry staff were issued immediate redundancy notices by P & O…….Open Democracy also noted that she was a member of the Tory party’s infamous ERG which welcomes more right wing members of the Tory party within it’s membership than those other Tories assumed to be more liberal minded……she also campaigned for Liz Truss in her leadership campaign to be Tory leader…. so her judgement, as well as her morality, is not an asset for New New Labour party then….. yet somehow seems so appropriate….LOL

    Indeed one could argue that she, Natalie Elphicke, was more right wing than the current Tory PM Rishi Sunak……yet she has been welcomed into the Labour party….the Q voters should be asking is why ?

    The fact is this defection is not ,by any means, a positive for the Labour party…..this is a Tory MP who many fair minded voters considered to be an extreme member of the Tory party ,based on her outspoken and far from generous to others views, who has now calculated, via opinion polls, that her seat may be on a shoogly peg, thus as she has also realised that the Labour party under Keir Starmer is someone who is openly welcoming and embracing Tory ideology within his party then she knew there would be a place for her and those like her….to survive politically (perhaps) come the next GE…..under a Red(ish) rosette tinged with blue…..(she has also been reported previously as being less than complimentary to Keir Starmer as Labour leader and also has slated Labour as a political party….so her resolve, via her opinion, is also it seems very flexible dependent I think more upon how she assumes it will benefit her politically going forward via the next UK GE).

    If Labour are welcoming people like Natalie Elphicke , as an MP into their party, then that is a sure sign that they , as a political party, are now discarding any false notion that they are a party for the working man or as their branch office pretend, as in them being in any way ‘socialist’, in their policies and future direction as political party and as (perhaps) the next UK government…..or are they, Labour, so desperate for power that any rogue is given the red(ish) carpet treatment….to win over who in their UK ?…..more Tories as in other Tory MP’s and also very much more Tory voters…….while leaving all other voters behind and thus not represented by them as a political party……and too as perhaps the next UK Govt.

    The BBC here are making much of the SNP being in supposed turmoil and disunity within their ranks…..while forgetting that Scotland is also (over) governed by a party (Tories) who are the UK government….and currently they, Tories, as a party are really the one’s in turmoil and disunity….that is now a total of three Tory MP’s defected to the Labour party…Christian Wakeford, Dan Poulter and now Elphicke…..will there be more that defect pre the next GE ?…and will the BBC here choose to promote them, the Tories, as a party, who also govern us in Scotland, who are the party who are in real turmoil within their ranks and too in a downward spiral in opinion polls….as many in the party are in opposition to who is their current leader…..as in Sunak.

    Plus will that same BBC here now speculate and opine on how a party such as the Labour party could be ever considered by the likes of Natalie Elphicke as a suitable party for her to defect to …..considering her history, rhetoric and right wing allegiance as a member of the ERG …..but also why would the Labour party allow someone with her (bad) record to join them……surely some division will be generated in allowing her, Elphicke, to defect to Labour , via any Left wing minded MP’s in their party….Q’s Q’s….all of that though will , I suspect , not be given the same scrutiny or debate they deserve via the media in Scotland as the SNP are frequently subjected to by that same BBC here ….indeed especially via the BBC here……will the branch office manager be asked his opinion on this…..and how will the Labour party’s PR newspaper The Daily Record handle this…or do they have a #SNPBAD headline on hold to promote on their front page tomorrow to deflect and divert attention away from this…..very very BAD news for Labour !

    Let’s be honest both Labour and the Tories ain’t as saintly as the media in Scotland often try to portray them (protect them) as being, either via their HQ’s or their branch offices…and also look how both of their branch offices behave towards the SNP as if they, Labour & Tories, themselves were members of parties who had no problems, division, turmoil and were politically squeaky clean……truth is you do not need to lift the carpet on either of them to see the dirt that clings to both of them as political parties !……but they and their media try to do a good job in attempting to sweep much of that dirt….under the carpet…..alas we on here, and others too, brush up on our facts and truth as far they, as political parties, are both concerned…..Amen to that…..LOL

    Vote SNP in the next GE….unless you want to be governed by a Tory party…..as in the actual one or the new pound shop one aka New New Labour party…..as a UK government.

    NMRN

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