I've covered the politics of Police Scotland since before the 2013 merger, and Chief Constable @CC_Livingstone's remarks on the police budget at today's @ScotPolAuth meeting are the undoubtedly the most scathing I've heard about the Scottish Government's funding of the force. 1/9
Chief Constable Iain Livingstone spoke of the "derisory" capital budget from government (despite SNP ministers routinely boasting of rises). Capital budget is the part which pays for all those buildings and vehicles we've seen falling apart in leaked photos in past few years. 2/9
Capital budget also meant to help fund projects to modernise/transform the force, which in theory could allow officer numbers (costing 88% of the routinely overspent force budget) to reduce, and therefore the budget to be balanced. It isn't enough,as figs I've collated show (3/9) 
In Chief Constable Iain Livingstone's words today: "Our capital budget is derisory for the size of organisation that we’ve got. We’ve come so far with our ability to make do and mend. We’ve come so far with the ability of officers and staff to have work-arounds." 4/9
Scot Gov often cites "real terms protection" of police budget when defending political/Scottish Police Federation criticism of lack of cash. Today, @CC_Livingstone demolished this - by pointing out the £200m cuts from pre-2013 setup far outweigh inflation-linked rises. 5/9
Ian Livingstone also asked SNP ministers for some of this £200million back. This, three weeks ahead of the Holyrood budget: “We’ve taken £200million a year out of the core cost of policing. I don’t think we’ve had the recognition and acknowledgement that that provides..” 6/9
Chief Constable continued: “...We’ve had real-terms protection but that’s only kicked in since 15-16. But the core cost of policing is £200million less every year prior to Police Scotland coming into being..." 7/9
"...So, our deficit is because, actually, our budget has been cut even greater than the savings we’ve managed to achieve. So, my pitch is actually.. ‘Can we get some of those savings back?’" Extraordinary from @CC_Livingstone. Big pressure now on Finance Sec @DerekMackaySNP 8/9
This comes in the context of pressure on Police Scotland to cut numbers - during the busiest ever policing year for the force, with @ukcop26 being held in Glasgow in Nov, plus Euro 2020 matches, and growing numbers of Loyalist/Republican marches. thescottishsun.co.uk/news/scottish-… 9/9
@ukcop26 table from tweet 3/9 .. but with typo corrected (sigh)
