Chamber and committees

Thank you for sharing that with us. The point that you have made highlights to me that, in the short period of time between Rhys going missing and his body being discovered, the police made mistakes. Is that fair?

So, what would your message be to us about what it is that we need to fix here? We are all human, so we make mistakes. The police will make mistakes, because we all make mistakes.

I have been a politician for years, and I have made mistakes and got some things wrong, but it is important to be open.

Mr Johnstone, you raise an important issue, which Stephanie Bonner also raised with us in the earlier evidence session, that there appears to be a necessity for the initial investigation of complaints about police conduct to be handled by a body outside Police Scotland. Is that your reflection on your experience?

Does the PIRC meet your expectations?

Do you think that that is just the nature of it? You have made a strong argument that all these issues need to be taken way out of the hands of anybody who has had anything to do with them previously. In a logical sense, that is the type of approach that we would take in all processes. We cannot, for example, have somebody on a panel making a decision if they have been involved in the case beforehand.

You pose a significant challenge to the committee. You have marshalled your arguments powerfully in front of the committee, and they raise a huge question about the transparency of actions and the confidence that members of the public and the committee can have in the culture of the police force and those who scrutinise the police force as being essentially built around the principle of transparency. Do you have any further thoughts that you could share with us about how we might strengthen the provisions that are in front of us and address the concerns that you have expressed?

Do you think that your experience of the complaints process, which you have made very clear to us was a terrible experience, was bad because the police could not face up to the fact that they had mishandled the initial investigation?

So that was not your experience of what happened here. The police did not say to you, “Look, we’ve got this wrong”?

Thank you.