Police officers would have to pay thousands of pounds for their training under proposals being considered by Scotland's most senior ranks.
Police officers would have to pay thousands of pounds for their training under proposals being considered by Scotland's most senior ranks.
Chief Constables have created a working group to consider plans which would mean members of the public paying for their own police degrees and then applying to join the service.
The move would signal a radical departure from the traditional entry to forces in which successful applicants undergo a rigorous 15-week training programme at the Scottish Police College (SPC) at Tulliallan in Fife, for which they pay nothing.
The Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland (Acpos) has set up a group to look at the feasibility and savings of the proposal. It would mean that officers would pay for their qualifications in the same way that nurses and doctors do.
A discussion document compiled by Kevin Mathieson, Chief Constable of Tayside, suggests the move could save £7.7m if the 1650 new probationers over the past two years had paid for their own training. That works out at £4666 for each officer.
It states: "If students were to be trained before employment, with no salary paid to them during training, (approximately £7.7m) is the effective annual saving that the Scottish Police Service could make. This could either be translated into an efficiency saving or a direct increase in the number of police officers deployed in our communities.
"There are other potential benefits, including the opportunity to move more quickly than currently to recruit and put officers on the street and potential to build upon national recruitment by holding other elements of the process at SPC such as medicals and vetting.
"The concept also lends itself to recruiting younger officers direct from school/college and could fit within a larger qualifications framework."
The idea is, in part, based on training in parts of the US. In a number of states, applicants can pay their own way through police training. Forces then recruit fully trained officers.
In Illinois, prospective police pay up to $3650 (£1878) to go through the academy.
The comparison closer to home is nurses and midwives who take three to four years to train but are automatically eligible for a bursary of £6411 for the first three years, dropping to £4808 in the fourth year.
While teachers have to support themselves, either when doing an undergraduate teaching degree or postgraduate diploma, course fees are met by the taxpayer, through the Student Awards Agency for Scotland.
Currently, all new recruits to the police service spend 15 weeks training at the national police college at Tulliallan, paid for through government funding. Most will then spend 30 years in the service in order to claim their full pension. Only those specialising in certain areas, or applying for promotion, face additional tests and training.
Mr Mathieson said: "Once we get through the current recruitment bulge and we have consulted with the police college, we will certainly be exploring this.
"We've not come to a firm view about the future direction but we are looking at the savings it could bring for the taxpayer."
Forces are currently struggling to recruit sufficient officers to cover the current retirement bulge caused by a recruitment drive in the late 1970s and the Scottish Government's pledge to put an additional 1000 police officers out into communities so the move is unlikely to be introduced in the short term.
Two years ago, Malcolm Dickson, the former Deputy Chief Inspector of Constabulary, called for a nationwide debate on how police training is funded, and questioned why police officers receive free training but doctors do not. He also called for ongoing testing of police.
