Scotland’s police chief has admitted that no new jobs will be created in Inverness when a national unit opens in the city.
Despite previous promises, Chief Constable Phil Gormley confirmed yesterday that there would be “probably no additional jobs” and that the new National Database Enquiry Unit was likely to be shared with Glasgow.
Plans for the new inquiry centre were unveiled in 2014 when it was revealed that the police control room in the Highland capital would close.
Mr Gormley visited the city yesterday for talks with Highland Council leader Margaret Davidson, who had raised concerns that posts could actually be axed after it emerged that the new unit could be shared with Govan.
After the meeting, the police chief confirmed that the unit was likely to be shared, but insisted that no jobs would be lost, and that 15 officers will go back to policing duties in the north.
He said: “A recommendation will go forward to the police authority this month. In essence what we’re going to put in place is a single national unit probably located in more than one location, Inverness being one of them.”
Asked if the proposal had been watered down from previous promises, Mr Gormley said: “No not at all, what has happened is that we’ve done some very sensible thinking in relation to jobs here, and nobody who has got a job in the present environment will be losing their job.
“There will be probably no additional jobs, but what I’m saying is that there are going to be 15 officers who will be released to go back and police the Highlands, and Inverness in particular.”
However, he also signalled that the force could have handled the issue better, saying: “You can always communicate better and if we can learn lessons from that, as we continue to develop our local approaches to policing, if we can be better then that would be my ambition.”
Mrs Davidson said: “It looks very much, although the final decision won’t be made until the board later this month, that we’ll be retaining the number of jobs in Highlands that we’ve already got but we won’t be getting the increase that we were promised.
“Well paid, secure jobs in the Highlands are not that easy to come by so my disappointment is that’s being whisked away from us again, and at the same time we’re losing our call centre.”