Nine police officers are attacked on duty each day

POLICE officers were subjected to more than 800 assaults over the course of just three months this year, new figures show.

An average of more than nine assaults were inflicted every day on serving officers during the first quarter of this year.

During this period, 860 attacks were committed, with an average of five working days lost for every assault.

This was slightly down from the 1,031 over the same time period in 2020-21, which was a significant rise from 764 assaults in 2019-20.

Injuries such as stabbings with needles doubled in 2020-21, and injuries during an arrest rose by 12.5 per cent.

In 1919 Magazine, which focuses on Scotland’s justice and social affairs, an experienced Police Scotland officer said: ‘The main underlying cause of violence against police is lack of police officers. You’re lucky if you’re sending two cops to go to a call where historically there might have been four, five, six in two or three cars.’

In the first quarter of the year there were five cases of officers being injured by needles.

The most common injuries were bruising and inflammation with 233 cases, followed by 222 cases of exposure to hazardous substance and 133 reports of a cut or laceration.

Last year, John Dow was jailed after choking an officer and rendering him unconscious. Colleagues feared PC Paul Gavan had been killed after the thug attacked him at a disturbance in Coatbridge, Lanarkshire. A total of 225 working days were lost over the three-month period. This is in comparison to 910 days lost due to potential or confirmed exposure to Covid.

The statistics come from a health and safety report, sent to the Scottish Police Authority’s

People’s Committee last month, which highlighted a series of incidents.

This included one case of an officer attending a violent domestic incident in Glasgow where a man was brandishing a knife close to paramedics. He swung the knife at officers when they tried to engage with him and struck one on the chest.

The report raised the ‘continued increase in police officer and police staff assaults’ as an area of ‘concern’.

Deputy Chief Constable Fiona Taylor said: ‘Officers and staff work with dedication and a commitment to helping people, and violence against them is deplorable and unacceptable.

‘It is not simply part of the job and will not be tolerated.

‘It causes physical and psychological harm to dedicated public servants and there is also a cost to the public purse through days lost to ill-health or personal injury claims.’

Those who carry out serious attacks on police officers can face up to life imprisonment under common law offences.

There are also specific offences relating to police assaults in the Police and Fire Reform (Scotand) Act and Emergency Workers (Scotland) Act.

A Scottish Government spokesman said: ‘No one should be the victim of abuse or violence at work, and assaults on police officers are completely unacceptable.

‘The health and safety of police officers is a matter for the chief constable, who has made a commitment for 2021/22 that he will continue to take action to reduce the impact on officers and staff of violence in all its forms.’

‘Deplorable and unacceptable’