Police Scotland’s troubled call centres would receive thousands of extra calls if it took on the responsibility of the British Transport Police north of the border, it has emerged.
The Scottish Government admitted the merger would trigger around 2000 extra emergency calls every year.
The statistics were revealed following a parliamentary question by Scottish Conservative Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Liz Smith.
Justice secretary Michael Matheson said in today’s response that around five per cent of the BTP’s annual 37,000 emergency calls came from Scotland.
If the SNP plans to take control of the BTP go ahead, that would mean those calls would have to be dealt with by Police Scotland.
The single force has come under extreme criticism in recent months for centralising call centres across Scotland, meaning handlers don’t have the local knowledge of their predecessors.
The problems culminated in the tragic incident of two people lying unattended for three days after crashing their car off the M9, despite police being contacted.
Both individuals died following the incident, and pressure has been mounting on both Police Scotland and the Scottish Government ever since.
The Scottish Conservatives said last month the proposed merger should be put on hold until the single force could prove itself capable of taking on the additional work.
Scottish Conservative Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Liz Smith said:
“Given the problems Police Scotland has faced in recent months, this is not the time for it to be taking on the extra work of the BTP too.
“This analysis by the Scottish Government shows that merger would result in thousands of extra emergency calls coming to police.
“But as it stands, there are doubts as to whether the single force can even cope with the current number of emergency and non-emergency calls it receives, let alone having to consider the rail network too.
“It’s more evidence that this decision needs to be shelved for now.
“The work of the BTP is respected right across the country – it would be wrong to take it away and place it in the hands of an organisation whose stock has never been lower.”