In his explosive new book entitled ‘The Enforcer: A Life Fighting Crime’, Graeme Pearson – former assistant chief constable of Strathclyde Police – suggests that the SCDEA (itself created in 2001 to work alongside the Serious Organised Crime Agency in the UK) has been strangled by red tape, having been taken over and changed for the worse by ‘faceless’ civil servants.
Pearson is also concerned that the proceeds of crime laws are not punishing the wealthiest criminals, while gangsters are allegedly lining up to cash in on the 2014 Commonwealth Games (to be held in Glasgow, where Pearson was born and raised in Partick).
The former police chief also believes that it’s wrong for Scotland to have eight police forces when London has just one – the Metropolitan Police Service – to oversee what is a much larger concentration of individuals.
“The current situation suits the eight forces because the status quo is maintained,” asserted Pearson. “It also suits the civil servants, because they can keep control of things. Unfortunately, it also kept us at a distance. I don’t think it makes sense, but until there’s a way of persuading politicians then nothing’s going to change. We’re fed one-line sound bites but we need more than that. Politicians want to say ‘Yes’ to everything but end up saying ‘No’ to it all instead.”
Mired in red tape
Pearson was first appointed director-general of the SCDEA in late 2004, but decided to stand down less than a year after control of the organisation was handed over to the Scottish Police Services Authority. The suggestion is that, almost overnight, Pearson and his colleagues were “mired in red tape” and “made to answer to a faceless committee”. The takeover of the SCDEA, which was orchestrated by Labour and supported by Alex Salmond’s Scottish National Party, is alleged to have choked ‘The Untouchables’ in bureaucracy.
In an exclusive interview with The Sunday Mail’s reporter Russell Findlay, Pearson stated: “The old administration allowed the arrangements to be put in place, and the new one just accepted them. There was a reluctance to allow the agency to become all it could be. You found yourself working in treacle, and there was no explanation as to why the job was being made so difficult. We had more meetings about co-ordinating matters than we did on actually targeting the criminals.”
Offering further stinging criticisms, Pearson continued: “Committees, panels and task forces seldom deliver the innovation and commitment of a named individual. That’s why we hardly ever use committees to decide battle strategies in times of war. We nominate leaders, and then provide the governance and control that offers effective support. The current arrangement, with the SCDEA being responsible to the Scottish Police Services Authority, is in my opinion simply not fit for purpose.”
Desire for a neat administration
During his four years in charge of the SCDEA, Pearson and his team recovered more than GB pound 125 million of illicit drugs, seized stolen firearms and also tackled the abhorrent practice of human trafficking, but continual interference from civil servants “pursuing their desire for a neat administration” frustrated the SCDEA’s development as a stand-alone operation. Positive statements were made by the politicians, but the reality was a new oversight arrangement for the organisation that Pearson deemed to be “wholly inappropriate”.
As the 2007 Holyrood elections loomed, the Scottish politicians necessarily became distracted. In the vacuum left behind them, administrators began delivering what they wanted. “Decisions began to be taken without any consultation,” explained Pearson, “forcing changes within the agency which were counter to our strategy. The lack of candour throughout this period was enormously tiresome.”
Pearson went on to comment: “From my appearances at the Justice Committee in the Scottish Parliament and following discussions with several members of the Parliament from all parties, I knew there was cross-party support for not only an effective but a powerful Scottish FBI. What was now being constructed was an additional layer of administration within a costly and old-fashioned structure focused on efficiency savings and continual rationalisations.”
Crime campus still to take shape
Now an honorary professor at Glasgow University’s fledgling Institute for the Study of Serious Organised Crime, Pearson is also frustrated that his visions for a specialist crime-fighting campus now appear to be in limbo. Four years ago, he and the (then) justice secretary Cathy Jamieson laid down specific plans to relocated the SCDEA and other agencies to a site in Gartcosh, Lanarkshire before 2010. Pearson even won the interest of world famous architect Lord Norman Foster, who could see the vision of campuses across the world being able to contact each other on issues relating to organised crime.
“How come that here we are, five years later, and not even a bag of sand has been delivered to Gartcosh?” bemoaned Pearson, who began his police life as a beat officer back in the 1970s and was one of the first senior officers to warn of the danger of organised crime and corruption north of the border.
“The pressures under which the SCDEA staff operate mean that the campus is needed as soon as possible, not at some time in the next decade. The agency needs to be better located to cope with the security and protection of both staff and systems.”
Top crime lords never sully their hands
Pearson also admits that Scotland’s top criminals are infrequently troubled by the proceeds of crime laws designed specifically to target them. They are all-too-often impossible to prosecute as they don’t ‘get their hands dirty’.
“The laws shouldn’t be a taxation, rather they should be a real penalty,” he stated. “Too often, those with multimillion pound empires have given back tens of thousands of pounds.”
Pearson warns politicians to maintain a safe distance from organised criminals such that they can avoid a repeat of the 2002 Red Rose scandal (where ex-Home Secretary Dr John Reid and former Scottish First Minister Jack McConnell were seen at the same Labour fundraiser as drug dealer Justin McAlroy). McAlroy was shot dead just days later.
In no way were Reid and McConnell linked to the criminal fraternity, but Pearson explained: “If people see organised criminals sitting with key figures, it creates in their mind the complete inability to report anything. The balance needs to be shifted so that we can draw a line whereby we prevent criminals from trying to make themselves legitimate by association.”