Terrorism fight given £3.8m boost

The Scottish Government is to provide Scotland’s police forces with an additional £3.8 million over the next two years to combat terrorism and protect our communities.

The funding will enable the creation of over 50 counter terrorism posts across Scotland. These will help to make our ports and airports more secure and allow the police to work with communities to raise awareness of terrorism.

This is combined with the work going on both within the Scottish Government and with the UK Government to ensure the safety and security of the people of Scotland and the prosecution of terrorists.

In particular the Scottish Government is developing with ACPOS and key agencies a Scottish approach to preventing terrorism as part of the UK counter-terrorism strategy CONTEST.  This will focus on improving communications, improving knowledge and understanding and, through a new delivery unit, co-ordinating project interventions.

The work is delivered through:

- the SGORR Cabinet Sub-Committee, which keeps under review the Scottish Government’s policy for managing the consequences of major emergencies;

- the Resilience Advisory Board for Scotland, which includes chief officer representatives of all the main responder organisations and provides a co-ordinated strategic direction for emergency planning in Scotland and

- the Scottish Resilience Capabilities Programme, through which we are continuing to link work in Scotland to the delivery of the UK Government’s CONTEST strategy.

Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill said:

“All in Scotland, regardless of their background, are united by their common humanity, and Scotland came together a year ago to stand united as a nation against terrorism.  Our diversity gives us strength, and that strength was clearly demonstrated when our communities united to show their disgust and contempt for those who attacked Glasgow Airport so ruthlessly last year.

“As last year’s attack at Glasgow airport showed, terrorism respects no boundaries. Terrorism is a threat to all of our communities.  We all need to work together to reduce the threat of another terrorist attack.

“The Scottish Government is fully committed to the fight against terrorism and that is why we are equipping our police forces to tackle this menace.  These additional counter terrorism officers will help to make our ports and airports more secure and allow the police to work with communities to raise awareness of terrorism and related issues to make Scotland a safer place.

“We will continue to work with other jurisdictions, south of the border and elsewhere to ensure the safety of all our citizens and that those who seek to disrupt our way of life to perpetrate terror are prosecuted for their crimes.”

ENDS

Notes: 

1. Counter terrorism is an element of National Security, which is reserved to Westminster.  Since 2003, CONTEST has been the UK framework for countering terrorism.  Many aspects of prevention and consequence management are devolved, however, and the Scottish Government plays a prominent role
In delivering the CONTEST strategy in Scotland.

2. In Scotland the amount of police grant paid directly to police authorities will increase by almost £53 million over the next 3 years.   Under the terms of the joint Concordat, it is for police authorities to negotiate jointly the amount of funding that will be provided by the local authorities to meet policing costs.  This is part of the new relationship with local government, where we stand back from micro-managing service delivery, freeing up local authorities and their partners to get on with the job.

3. The amount of police grant available to Police Authorities in each year from 2007-08 to 2010-11 is as follows:

2007-08  £549.4m
2008-09  £566.6m
2009-10  £584.2m
2010-11  £602.2m