Custody inspection report - Highland and Islands

During the course of 2022, HMICS and HIS collaborated on a baseline review of the provision of healthcare services to police custody centres across Scotland. A report outlining our findings and recommendations was published in January 2023. We used learning from the review to develop a framework to inspect healthcare provision within police custody, and to devise a methodology for the joint inspection of police custody centres.

Following completion of the baseline review, we commenced a programme of joint custody inspections and, to date, have published eight custody inspection reports. The findings from these can be found on our website. We have also recently published a revised version of our custody inspection framework, which can be found here. It outlines the quality indicators that form the basis of our custody inspections. This report relates to our inspection of the main custody centres servicing the regions covered by Police Scotland’s Highland and Islands Division, referred to as N division. The division covers the local authority areas of Highland, Na h-Eileanan an lar (formerly Western Isles), Shetland and Orkney.

Due to the significant geographical footprint of N division, coupled with a dispersed populace, the provision of police custody services comprises of a bespoke operating model featuring a primary custody centre in Inverness, staffed by members of the Criminal Justice Services Division of Police Scotland. Where practicable, custody supervisors based at Inverness provide support, coordination and direction via remote video links to operate the ten ancillary centres, staffed by local policing officers from N division. The centres we inspected included Inverness Police Station and the ancillary centres located at Wick, Fort William, Stornoway, Lerwick and Kirkwall police stations.

The inspection was carried out by HMICS and HIS, the aim of which was to assess the treatment of, and conditions for, individuals detained at the custody centres. This report provides an analysis of the quality of custody centre operations as well as the provision of healthcare services in the custody centres and consequently makes recommendations for both Police Scotland and the health boards within NHS Highland, NHS Western Isles, NHS Shetland and NHS Orkney respectively.

The onsite stage of the inspection took place in June 2025. As part of our inspection, we reviewed the Police Scotland National Custody System (NCS) and examined a representative sample of detainees processed at the custody centres between October 2024 and March 2025 inclusive. We assessed the physical environment, including the quality of cells, and observed key processes and procedures relevant to police custody operations. We also spoke with people detained at the custody centres and interviewed custody staff and healthcare professionals during our visit.

During this inspection, we found common themes that have featured as recommendations in our previously published custody inspection reports. We have referenced these within the body of this report where relevant.

This report, similar to recently published inspection reports, highlights our concerns regarding a lack of consistency in the recording of information on the NCS. While some aspects of custody centre operations were recorded well, such as the recording of information relating to criminal justice decisions, we saw multiple recording gaps regarding observations, meals, handovers, healthcare consultations, care plan rationale, grounds to delay release, and provision of information on legal rights. We have continued to find disparities, in some cases, between the risk assessments undertaken and the corresponding care plans put in place to mitigate risk. We found significant delays between scheduled cell visit times and subsequent recording on NCS.

We found inconsistencies in the frequency and quality of intrusive remote supervisory oversight of custody operations, and limited evidence of effective quality assurance reviews of operational practice. This quality assurance deficit is an area where we have previously made recommendations for improvement and highlighted the need for increased line management presence within custody centres to monitor and influence the quality and consistency of custody centre operations.

We recognise the recent creation of a new CJSD scrutiny and audit post, which alongside the existing audit function provided by custody review inspectors, has, to a degree, increased the level of scrutiny applied to custody delivery. However, the overall volume of custody records subject to audit and scrutiny, still represents a proportionately modest sample of the total volume of national custody throughput.

Our report also outlines the need for improvement in the arrangements for detainee CCTV observations at the custody centres and notes shortcomings regarding the availability of suitably sized anti-harm clothing for detainees, and the lack of availability of modern fingerprint identification facilities at ancillary centres.

We have raised concerns in previous reports regarding a lack of management oversight of children detained in police custody and have found further instances during the course of this inspection. Our review of custody records found examples of children held overnight in police cells at Inverness custody centre having been arrested for what inspectors considered to be relatively minor offences that took place in a residential childcare setting – only to be returned the following morning. While the provision of suitable alternative accommodation remains a challenge for childcare agencies across the country, we do not consider police cells to be an appropriate interim option, especially for such long periods.

We have previously raised a recommendation in respect of this matter, however consider that additional attention should be given to making the changes to culture and practice needed to address this issue.

The report contains a total of thirty seven healthcare related recommendations relevant to the provision of healthcare by the four health boards with responsibility for the aforementioned custody centres. These cover a range of issues including governance, improved protocols and procedures, staff training, improved communication between healthcare and custody staff, and cleaning standards.

Police custody has been subject to considerable scrutiny by HMICS since Police Scotland was established. Police Scotland has made progress in implementing previous recommendations in respect of custody services and is actively working to address those that remain outstanding.

We wish to thank the officers and staff from CJSD and local policing, as well as staff from the respective NHS authorities that are responsible for the overall management of healthcare at the respective centres.

The custody inspection programme is overseen by Ray Jones, Lead Inspector at HIMCS, with support from HMICS Associate Inspectors and HIS Inspectors.

Craig Naylor
His Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary
November 2025