Police Scotland has defended its decision to spend more than £700,000 replacing windows at its Dundee HQ after a union chief said the cash would be better spent cutting redundancies.
Work is under way to upgrade the windows, which date back to the Bell Street building’s opening in 1977, as well as installing insulation.
Police Scotland said the funding for the new blue-tinted windows comes from its capital allocation and does not involve diverting resources from staffing budgets.
But Drew Livingstone, Unison’s Police Staff Scotland services and conditions officer in Dundee, branded this explanation a “big con”.
He said: “They’re distinguishing between the different pots of money for different projects within Police Scotland but it’s all public money.
“It annoys me that they frequently have to distinguish between the two to justify huge spending on things we don’t necessarily need.
“The irony is that they are putting in double glazing to offices which are sitting vacant because police staff have been made redundant.
“We have an almost brand-new call handling room that has 12 call handlers that are going to be made redundant in 18 months’ time.
“If people had to make a choice between a slightly draughty office and a job, they’d choose a job every time.”
Mr Livingstone said the ongoing upgrade was “quite literally window dressing”.
He said: “They are probably tinting the windows blue so passersby can’t see the large number of police officers working behind desks backfilling for redundant police staff, when they should be out on the street.”
The Dundee upgrade is included in the Scottish Police Authority’s building works legacy project, which will be discussed at its finance and investment committee in Glasgow.
A Police Scotland spokesman said the cost of the work would be £709,000 with the majority of this carried into the next financial year because of delays due to the manufacturing of the windows.
The spokesman said: “It is updating a premises that is well over 35 years old. The money for the windows comes from the capital allocation and does not involve money towards staffing.
“We are making the building better for people to work in.”