Angus councillors have spoken out over planned closures of public counters at three police stations in the county.
Police Scotland announced that as part of a cost-cutting drive they were proposing to close their public counters at Carnoustie, Montrose and Brechin.
They announced more than 60 counter closures around Scotland, arguing that people can report crimes over the phone.
The move has provoked outrage from Montrose councillor David May, who claimed Angus was “losing out”.
He said: “I have always publicly opposed the SNP Government’s centralisation of our police forces and it is becomingly increasingly clear that rural councils such as Angus are losing out.
“We are facing the possibility of cuts to our police counters in Montrose, Brechin and Carnoustie.
“If this goes ahead, local residents in these areas will no longer be able to report directly to their local police station but will have to contact a call centre so much for protecting local policing.”
Mr May said he intended to contact the chief executive of Angus Council and his MSPs to raise his concerns.
The opening hours of public counters at police stations in Forfar and Arbroath are also set to change under the plans from 8.30am and 4.30pm to between 9am and 5pm from Monday to Friday.
Carnoustie councillor Brian Boyd described the plans as a “very sad day for Angus as far as policing is concerned”.
He said: “The consultation has just arrived in my post and it does make disappointing reading. The fears of how a national police force will move the service forward is now coming to fruition very quickly and not necessarily in a positive way. I will be investigating with senior officers to see if the counter service can be moved into the council’s access office in the High Street. This seems to have worked well in other Angus burghs.”
Brechin councillor Bob Myles also backed a counter-sharing service between the council and police, which he said had worked well in Monifieth and Kirriemuir.
He said: “Brechin is ripe for something like that. It means you don’t need two lots of staff manning a desk. People in the town will want some sort of police presence and we would be happy to look at merging accommodation.
“This would go a long way to satisfy people because at least they would have a point of call if they had comments for the police. If they take away the service completely, I won’t be happy.
“I appreciate the police want to rationalise their estate but if they take away the local offices, people don’t know who they are or where they are.
“The other question is what will they do with the building in Brechin as it’s a very central location.”
Police have said the proposals have been made following public counter demand surveys at every police station.
The survey monitored traffic and how many of the requests were ‘essential’ a service that can only be accessed via face-to-face contact at the station.
In Montrose, which opens from 9am to 1pm on Monday to Friday, there were 110 demands made of the station assistant, of which 19 were essential.
There were 22 demands at Brechin station in three days and 25 demands in five days at Carnoustie. Each station just had one ‘essential’ demand.
There were 243 demands in nine days at Arbroath police station, of which 55 were essential, and 263 demands in nine days at Forfar, of which 50 were assessed as essential public counter functions.