Tayside Police was a territorial police force covering the Scottish

council areas For local government purposes, Scotland is divided into 32 areas designated as "council areas" (), which are all governed by single-tier authorities designated as "councils". They have the option under the Local Government (Gaelic Names) (Sc ...

Angus Angus may refer to: *Angus, Scotland, a council area of Scotland, and formerly a province, sheriffdom, county and district of Scotland * Angus, Canada, a community in Essa, Ontario Animals * Angus cattle, various breeds of beef cattle Media * ...

Dundee City Dundee is a city in Scotland, a constituent country of the United Kingdom. Dundee City may also refer to: *Dundee City (council area), a unitary district established in 1996 **Dundee City Council, the local authority body in the city *Dundee (distr ...

and

Perth and Kinross Perth and Kinross (; ) is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, and a Lieutenancy areas of Scotland, lieutenancy area. It is bordered by Highland (council area), Highland and Aberdeenshire to the north, Angus, Scotland, Angus, Dundee, and F ...

(the former

Tayside Tayside () was one of the nine regions used for local government in Scotland from 16 May 1975 to 31 March 1996. The region was named after the River Tay. History Tayside region was created in 1975 under the Local Government (Scotland) Act ...

region) until 1 April 2013, at which point it was subsumed into

Police Scotland Police Scotland (), officially the Police Service of Scotland (), is the national police force of Scotland. It was formed in 2013, through the merging of eight regional police forces in Scotland, as well as the specialist services of the Scottis ...

. The total area covered by the force was with a population of 388,000. The force operated from 27 police stations and has an establishment of 1078

police officers A police officer (also called policeman or policewoman, cop, officer or constable) is a warranted law employee of a police force. In most countries, ''police officer'' is a generic term not specifying a particular rank. In some, the use of ...

, 151 special constables and 594 support staff, as of February 2008. Tayside Police was Scotland's fourth-largest police force.

History

It was formed on 16 May 1975, with the region of Tayside, as an amalgamation of the Perth and Kinross Constabulary, Angus Constabulary and City of Dundee Police. The force was operationally subdivided into three Divisions, equating to the respective council areas - Western Division serves

, Eastern Division serves

and Central Division serves the

Dundee City council area Dundee (; ; or , ) is the List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, fourth-largest city in Scotland. The mid-year population estimate for the locality was . It lies within the eastern central Lowlands on the north bank of the Firt ...

. The work of the force was overseen by the Tayside Police Joint Board, whose 18 members are nominated by the respective councils (7 by Dundee, 6 by Perth & Kinross, 5 by Angus). Tayside Police were the first in Scotland and the UK to pilot new social media software, MyPolice, launched on 17 January 2011. In a three-month pilot, ten local community officers from the Southern Perthshire area tested the software by replying to community concerns, and using

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

to engage with communities. An

Act of the Scottish Parliament An act of the Scottish Parliament () is primary legislation made by the Scottish Parliament. The power to create acts was conferred to the Parliament by section 28 of the Scotland Act 1998 following the successful 1997 Scottish devolution ref ...

, the ''Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012'', created a single Police Service of Scotland - known as

- with effect from 1 April 2013. This merged the eight regional police forces in Scotland (including Tayside Police), together with the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency, into a single service covering the whole of Scotland. Police Scotland will have its headquarters at the Scottish Police College at Tulliallan in Fife.

Executive

Legacy Tayside command structure: * Chief Constable - Justine Curran * Deputy Chief Constable - Gordon Scobbie * Assistant Chief Constable (Temp) - A Wilson * Director of Corporate Services - Douglas Cross OBE FCMA Positions subsumed into the unified Police Service of Scotland “Police Scotland” from 1 April 2013. Currently the Chief Constable is Iain Livingstone QPM who was first appointed on the 15th of August 2018 and would formally take office on the 27th of August, same year.

References

External links

Tayside Police Museum on FacebookFormer Official website
Defunct police forces of Scotland Angus, Scotland Organisations based in Dundee Perth and Kinross Government agencies established in 1975 1975 establishments in Scotland Government agencies disestablished in 2013 2013 disestablishments in Scotland Tayside {{UK-law-enforcement-agency-stub