A FORMER Justice Secretary has said Scotland’s top police officer must leave “for the good of the service” after a build-up of problems at the force and its oversight body.

Kenny MacAskill said Chief Constable Phil Gormley should be paid off and “allowed to depart with dignity” after barely two years in post, not “hang around like a bad smell.”

He said: “Pay him out, get him out.”

Although many police officers and MSPs privately believe Mr Gormley will quit, Mr MacAskill is the most senior person to call on him publicly to do so.

Mr Gormley has been on special leave since September, at his own request, following complaints of misconduct and bullying against him by fellow senior officers.

The Police Investigations and Review Commissioner (Pirc) is currently investigating three complaints which could amount to gross misconduct.

On November 7, the board of the Scottish Police Authority (SPA), which oversees Police Scotland, agreed unanimously that Mr Gormley should return to work three days later.

However when then SPA chair Andrew Flanagan told the current SNP Justice Secretary of the decision on November 9, Michael Matheson urged him to “reconsider” because key players in the force and Pirc had not been informed.

The SPA hastily reversed its decision and Mr Gormley, who had been en route from his home in Norfolk to Scotland, was told to return home.

Mr Gormley's lawyer claims Mr Matheson had no lawful grounds to intervene after the SPA had made its decision.

On STV’s Scotland Tonight show on Wednesday, Mr MacAskill said Mr Gormley should go and suggested his deputy Iain Livingstone should take his place, working with the new SPA chair Susan Deacon.

He said: “I think basically we have to buy his contract out. I don’t think it’s credible that he comes back.

“There’s clearly issues with other senior command officers here.

“Iain Livingstone has steadied the ship. We’ve not got Susan Deacon working cooperatively and overseeing him. I think we have to let those two get on with it.

“I think it’ll be an expensive lesson to the SPA and to the government that Andrew Flanagan was the wrong appointment. Phil Gormley, equally, hasn’t worked out.

“Pay him out, get him out, and let’s get on with recruiting a new chief constable, in all likelihood Iain Livingstone.

"Due process has to be followed, both in complaints and indeed in recruitment. But we’ve got two good people now running the show.”

Former Labour MSP Graeme Pearson, a former head of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency, said taxpayers would be “paying yet again for incompetence”.

He said: “I think it’s very difficult to see him [Mr Gormley] returning after such a long period away.”

Writing in a newspaper this morning, Mr MacAskill said the problems at Police Scotland and the SPA since the police mergers in 2013 had been driven by personalities, not structures.

He said: “Mr Gormley should be allowed to depart with dignity, even if it means buying out the remainder his contract. But go he must, for the good of the service.

“The new chair and acting chief need to be allowed to get on with the job unfettered. He cannot hang around Tulliallan [HQ] like a bad smell.

“A new chief needs recruited, even if it’s hard to see past the current deputy. It’s time for the SPA to say: ‘Move along quietly, chief constable'."

Mr Matheson denied over-ruling the SPA, but did admit urging Mr Flanagan, to “reconsider” the process behind the decision to let Mr Gormley return.

He told Radio Scotland his main concern had been the SPA's flawed decision-making process, not the decision itself.

He said he would be happy for the release of any minutes of his meeting with Mr Flanagan to be released to allay concerns that he had cross a line and pushed the SPA into a U-turn.

he also said he would be content for Mr Gormley to return if the SPA took a robust, defensible decision that he should.

He said: “I accept public bodies don't always get these things right and it is appropriate that, where ministers are aware of that, they take appropriate measures in order to address it.

“When I was advised on November 9 that the Scottish Police Authority had two days earlier made a decision that the Chief Constable should return to his duties I asked for assurances on a number of key areas.

"First of all there was a live investigation being taken forward by the Police Investigations and Review Commissioner.

"Had they taken consideration of that and whether the return of the Chief Constable would impact on that investigation?

"Had they considered the welfare of staff and officers who had made the complaints and may be part of the investigation?

"And also, had they engaged with the command team at Police Scotland about the plans for the Chief Constable to return, which would have been the next morning

"Unfortunately the former chair of the Scottish Police Authority was unable to give me assurances on any of those matters."

On the same programme, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie said he would “probably” have acted in the same way as Mr Matheson.

He said: “It was quite astonishing what the full board of the SPA did without checking with the current Chief Constable Iain Livingstone, without checking with Pirc, the investigatory body, without making sure that welfare arrangements were in place for the members of staff who were involved in the inquiry into Phil Gormley, without checking on any of those things, without the inquiry being concluded, they invited him to come back to work."

He added: "It’s about time we had a root-and-branch review of Police Scotland to make sure we can avoid these kind of problems happening in the future."