Police Scotland 'eroding public trust' over stance on gender
Experts have said the Scottish Police Authority should be asking questions about the force’s approach to sex and gender
Police Scotland has been accused of damaging public trust by prioritising gender identity over sex in describing male suspects as women.
In what has been described as a worrying lack of transparency, the force has also declined to release documents detailing the basis for its policy decisions on the issue.
Police Scotland has repeatedly used “human rights” as a justification of standards relating to identifying perpetrators and carrying out full body searches.
The force’s human rights advisor, Jane Gordon, was awarded a £1 million contract for a five-year piece of work.
The issue most recently came to the fore following the arrest of a male suspect after an ‘unknown substance’ was found on a lamppost in Edinburgh.
A statement from the police service said the alleged perpetrator was a “30-year-old woman”.
When asked about the discrepancy, a spokeswoman told The Scotsman that accuracy would “move from a discussion about data recording to one that engages a person’s human rights, and their right to a private life”.
Dr Kath Murray of the policy think tank Murray Blackburn Mackenzie said: ”Police Scotland has made technical progress in recognising the relevance of sex.
“Yet as this case and its flawed transgender search policy show, the single service remains attached to the idea of gender self-identification.
“Without more transparency here we cannot know how far this is explained by its expensively brought-in human rights advice.
"The damage this is doing to public trust in the organisation is clear, however."
Chief Constable Jo Farrell gave evidence to the Public Petitions Committee in November 2025 on a parliamentary petition to ensure that the sex of suspects is recorded accurately in cases of rape.
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The Chief Constable said: “Our priorities relate to supporting victims; prosecuting offenders and making sure that those people are brought to justice; and ensuring that, by recording accurately biological sex, our crime data is accurate and we are able to use that information and data across policing and broader public policy.”
This position was confirmed in a Police Scotland Sex and Gender Update report, following a review led by Assistant Chief Constable (ACC) Catriona Paton.
The Paton Review was made public in March this year.
It confirmed that the single service would record biological sex across all crime types.
However, the review also confirmed the force would continue its interim transgender search guidance.
This allows trans-identified suspects to be strip-searched by an officer of the opposite sex, with the consent of the searching officer.
Similar ‘consensual’ searching policies in England and Wales are being challenged in the courts by the charity Sex Matters.
Assistant Chief Constable Catriona Paton credited Independent Human Rights Advisor Jane Gordon for assisting with the review.
Ms Gordon has been working with Police Scotland since 2022, including helping draft a human rights action plan.
Dr Murray said the force is using a “remarkable elasticity in terms of how the single service uses human rights to justify its varying policies”.
Throughout the Paton Review, human rights are used to explain the recording of biological sex and providing facilities based on sex.
Yet “human rights” are also used to justify the previous recording policy, which was based on gender self-ID.
Dr Murray added: “The apparent instability of Police Scotland’s position on human rights is compounded by a lack of transparency in this area.”
Murray Blackburn Mackenzie requested sight of Ms Gordon’s Baseline Review of Human Rights, which includes 37 policy recommendations, under freedom of information laws.
It took an appeal to the Information Commissioner before the document was released.
Dr Murray said the review makes no reference to Police Scotland policies in respect of the conflicting rights of women and trans people, despite the high-profile debate on the issue.
The academic said: “Whatever advice caused a Police Scotland spokeswoman to recently insist that ‘human rights’ require a male suspect to be described specifically as a ‘woman’ remains unclear, as does whether any such advice has come from Ms Gordon.”
She added: “For years, Police Scotland invoked the language of human rights to justify policies based on gender self-identification that disadvantaged women, including its own officers and staff.
“It has since taken significant steps to undo the institutional damage as a result of its attachment to gender identity ideology, also invoking the language of rights.”
However, she added: “It has still not drawn a clear line.
“The interim transgender search policy continues to put female officers in a near-impossible position.
“Worse still, the Scottish Government is seeking to cement this approach into its revised Code of Practice on Stop and Search.
“The case in Edinburgh further illustrates how Police Scotland continues to misuse the language of human rights to justify decisions that favour gender identity claims over other considerations, including public trust.”
She said the force’s reluctance to be open about the content of its human rights advisor’s advice “leaves its own officers and the wider public in the dark”.
“The Scottish Police Authority should ask to see all the advice it has received, and question the failure to publish it all,” Dr Murray added.
Chief Superintendent Joanne McEwan said the force has made “clear policy decisions and issued interim guidance relating to data recording standards”.
“The interim guidance in place relative to searches ensures Police Scotland’s focus is on protecting the safety, privacy, and dignity of everyone involved in the search, while supporting officers and staff to feel confident that they are conducting searches lawfully,” she added.
“The guidance was developed following extensive advice from our legal team and Independent Human Rights Advisor, as well as engagement with relevant business areas and staff associations.”
Police Scotland said it is waiting for the updated Scottish Government Code of Practice on Stop and Search of the Person in Scotland.
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