Professor John Robertson OBA
The Express today with Cop cuts putting public at risk? Rubbish.
Cop cuts?
From Safer Communities and Justice Statistics Monthly Data Report: August 2025, published today:
There were 16,427 full-time equivalent (FTE) police officers in Scotland on 30 June 2025. This was 193 (+1.2%) more officers compared to the position on 31 March 2007, and 220 (+1.4%) more than on 30 June 2024.
Police officer staffing has been maintained despite the crime level in Scotland falling from 385 509 in 2007/2008 when the SNP took over, to 299 111 last year, a 22% fall.
Public at risk? Rubbish, crime halved:
and murder rate in Scotland falls to same level as in Denmark, one of the safest places in the World
Denmark’s population is 5.97 million, 9.7% greater than Scotland’s 5.44 million.
In 2024/2025, there were 44 murders in Scotland and 48 in Denmark1, 9.07% more than in Scotland.
The murder rate in Denmark, 0.0804 cases per 100K, is lower than in Scotland, 0.0808 cases per 100K, but not statistically significantly different.
Sources:
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Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
Farage has spent the summer with his ‘Lawless Britain’ campaign and was given a huge amount of media coverage, with little media examination of his mendacious assertion.
Despite the data from Police Scotland the Scottish media give heavy coverage of crime in Scotland and of the gang war – but little mention of County Lines, although they gleefully trumpet ‘the worst drugs deaths in the world’.
The media, as Lord Rothermere of the Daily Mail said, exist ‘to give the British public its daily dose of fear’. People who are fearful tend to be less trusting of neighbours, tend to support reactionaries like Farage and the Tories.
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The Herald has a police story today as well.
It is about funding cuts to police budget putting people at risk. The Scottish Police Frederation wants more funding because of ‘falling police numbers and increasing workload’. Doesn’t sound as if the stats bear this out.
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The stats, what are they? I’d be asking if I was a story teller for the Eng HQ’d Herald.
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They probably did ask what the stats were but once finding out that they did not fit the narrative/spin they were going to push. Therefore the stats were omitted.
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Abused women do not get legal aid. Putting them at risk. They have to live in unsafe places.
Letting agencies illegally charges 6 month upfront rent. Putting people at risk.
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