A SENIOR Police Scotland figure has revealed how 80 per cent of incidents the force deals with are not criminal and include missing people and hospital absconders.
Assistant Chief Constable Malcolm Graham said the force attended more than 900,000 incidents last year and only about one in five ended in a recorded crime.
He said demand for police resources to deal with mental health incidents and missing people was increasing.
Mr Graham said officers attended more than 42,000 incidents in 2014/15 involving mental health or distress and a study in West Lothian found they spend, on average, four hours and 20 minutes dealing with a single incident relating to mental health, self-harm or attempted suicide.
He highlighted research by a police watchdog showing the cost of missing person inquiries in Scotland each year could range from £43 million to £80m, equivalent to three to five per cent of the annual policing budget.
His comments came in a written submission to Holyrood’s Justice Committee.
The British Medical Association Scotland also gave evidence to the committee. It said: “Our members say the police do a good job, often in difficult circumstances, often feeling, quite realistically, that they are dealing with things outwith their remit.
“That said, the police do have a role to play and they are very effective in managing an immediate response to people who are in distress or mentally ill, and to people behaving in a way that is violent or could be deemed a threat to the public.”
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