Scotland's chief constable Sir Stephen House has warned that abolishing consensual stop and searches could make policing more "legalistic and officious".

 

Sir Stephen welcomed a new Scottish Government group looking at ways to end or reduce such frisking, when members of the public turn out their pockets.

But the chief constable expressed concern about switching entirely to English-style statutory searches, when an officer compels a member of public on the basis of a formal suspicion.

Although far less widely used than consensual ones in Scotland, they are thought to have damaged community relations in London.

Sir Stephen said: "If people feel they would prefer there were no consensual search, then we will work with that.

"But people have to know what the ups and downs are. One of the downsides is you will lose the easiness, the informality of some stop-searches. That has been the experience in England, I think.

"The risk of moving away from a consensual framework, in my view, is that we become somewhat legalistic and formulaic. That would be a regret."

Around two-thirds of searches in Scotland are described as "consensual" and one-third statutory, although official watchdogs in a recent report stressed officers were far from clear on what a searches were or how to count them.

Official figures show stop-searches peaked before Police Scotland was launched in April 2013, with a huge rise in Sir Stephen's former Strathclyde force.

Human rights lawyer John Scott will now lead a review of such proposals on behalf of the Scottish Government.

Sir Stephen said he welcomed this process, and stressed that Scottish officers would endeavour to maintain their traditional informality whatever is decided.

But he also defended himself against political critics of his handling of the tactic.

Sir Stephen said: "On stop and search, people say it is a Strathclyde tool that has gone too far. Politicians keep saying it is going up.

"In both years of Police Scotland stop and search has gone down in numbers, not up. It is down year-on-year about 32 per cent this year.

"When you do stop and search it is not about what you do; it is about how you do it.

"Whenever you talk to people in London, they stress the difference in behaviour and demeanour between the Scottish officers and the English ones. During the Olympics and after the riots, Scottish officers in London said 'Hello' to people and people - after they were surprised - said 'Hello' back."

Sir Stephen stressed his own force had led by the way in ending consensual searches of under-12s, although the messy nature of police work means some children have still been frisked.

Expert Kath Murray, of Edinburgh University, said she doesn't believe English-style statutory frisking has to be "officious".

She said: "There's no reason why a search based on reasonable grounds can't be respectful and friendly.

"People are more likely to think they've been treated fairly when the grounds are explained to them, plus the search is more likely to result in detection."

She also stressed that the falls in the number of searches - consensual and statutory - under Police Scotland came from a huge peak.

She said: "The fall in stop searches from 2012/13 onwards is very much welcome, although it's worth noting that search rates at this earlier point were staggering.

"This means that, despite the sizeable drop, search rates are still comparatively high - around four times higher than England and Wales."