Sir Stephen House has announced his intention to step down as Chief Constable of Police Scotland by the end of the year - earlier than planned.

His time in charge of the newly-merged force has split opinion about whether he has been a force for good or not.

Here two voices have their say on the departing chief.

Chief Superintendent Niven Rennie, president of the Association Scottish Police Superintendents.

STEVE House has overseen the biggest public sector reorganisation since 1996 and whoever was the first chief constable of Police Scotland was on a hiding to nothing.

The formation of Police Scotland meant we had one chief constable, a figurehead identifiable with all policing.

It was seen as an SNP project even though most of the political parties, especially Labour, were supportive.

But since then policing has become very political and an attack on the Chief can be an attack on the government of the day.

We tend to have lost sight of the successes of Police Scotland, not least bringing eight forces with strong identities into one, an immense task in itself. But what has been focused on is the mistakes and mistakes in policing is nothing new.

The single force was created as part of of the reform of the public sector, we were under real pressure and it made sense for operational reasons to deal with issues like bureaucratic duplication. It was the right thing to do, made financial sense, was never going to happen over night and is only two years old.

It's also been the subject of a lot of fallacies. It's not been a takeover by Strathclyde. If anything its been a roll-out of Steve House's style of policing.

The idea of local scrutiny in the previous set-up was also little more than box ticking to endorse the views and plans of their chief constables.

But as a flagship idea of the SNP, any criticism was going to be political and amplified with the force caught in the middle. Although Police Scotland was part of Labour's manifesto I really believe their politicising of any policing matter has eroded public confidence in the police.

We now need to draw breath, let the new person come in and deliver the national priorities in the localised way I believe they can.

When Police Scotland was created Steve House was who was required for the job, he'd been in charge of the largest force and had the strength of character and strong will needed. Unfortunately he has become the story due to recent high profile issues.

Alison McInnes - Scottish Liberal Democrats spokeswoman

SIR Stephen House leaves a troubling legacy in his wake. Not only has he managed to forge a force that is both a heavy handed presence and yet remote from the communities it should serve, he has also allowed the morale of police and civilian staff to plummet.

But we should not be led to believe that his departure as head of Police Scotland draws a line under the chaos.

Sir Stephen House is responsible for championing a style of policing ill-suited to Scotland's diverse nature and it will take more than his resignation to unravel the culture he nurtured in the new organisation. The SNP government needs to think long and hard about the shortcomings of this deeply flawed organisation it is responsible for.

There are systemic problems which will not be solved by only removing the force’s staunchest defendants. Behind Kenny MacAskill and Sir Stephen House stands a top-down organisation built to bow to the demands of ministers in St Andrews house instead of local communities.

The SNP’s unrealistic savings claims, coupled with their dabbling in the operational running of the police, has seen officers moved from the frontline to perform civilian roles.

I have taken no pleasure from seeing the Liberal Democrats worst fears realised. The endemic use of so-called consensual stop and search, armed police on the streets of the Highlands, chaos in police control rooms and cuts to civilian staff are only a few of the consequences of a single force.