Exclusive: The force only record the nationality of a suspect in 50% of cases – and refused to hand over data about how many sex attacks are committed by foreign nationals.
07:38, 28 Mar 2026Updated 07:40, 28 Mar 2026
Police Scotland officers at the scene of an alleged rape in Sauchiehall Lane, Glasgow(Image: Tony Nicoletti/Daily Record)
Police Scotland doesn’t mandatory record the nationality of criminals – and only do so in 50% of crimes, according to shock new statistics. Concerns have been raised about sex attacks by migrants, with cases reported in the likes of Glasgow and Falkirk recently.
But the force refused to hand over data about how many foreign nationals have been charged with sexual crimes in each of the last three years and where they came from, insisting that this costs too much money (over £600). It later revealed that its officers only record nationalities in about half the suspects they arrest.
According to Reform UK, Glasgow’s streets are no longer as safe as they once were due to “a lot more men basically from foreign lands, not speaking English as their first language.” Scottish leader Malcolm Offord claimed that women felt unsafe when walking home from nights out.
Police Scotland confirmed that before 2024, crime reports didn’t include nationality as a field. It said: “Crime reports were held on the legacy crime recording systems of the eight former Scottish police forces. Those systems varied significantly in terms of capability and system architecture and in terms of national data, information from key fields was drawn into a central data store, from which management information/ statistics could be produced.
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“In terms of your request, nationality was not one of those fields. That means that for that earlier period, case by case assessment of individual crime reports would be required in order to extract and note the information sought.”
From January 2024, a new national system was rolled out which “does have a searchable field for the nationality of an individual in connection with a crime report, but the field is not mandatory, and experience thus far demonstrates that it has only been completed for around 50% of detected crimes (those where an accused has been identified and there exists a sufficiency of evidence under Scots Law to justify consideration of criminal proceedings).”
Scottish Conservative MSP Sharon Dowey(Image: Getty Images)
This revelation led to stark criticism from the Scottish Tories. Sharon Dowey, who served as the shadow community safety minister, told the Scottish Daily Express: “The public will be alarmed that Police Scotland are still not routinely recording this data. Serious questions must be answered as to why the nationality of those committing serious crimes is not able to be recorded accurately.
“That points to a force that is buckling under the pressure of being hit by years of SNP cuts. The Scottish Conservatives have repeatedly called on the SNP to work with the Home Office to deport foreign criminals from Scotland. The SNP’s soft-touch approach and failure to support Police Scotland simply isn’t working. That is why you should vote Scottish Conservative on your peach ballot paper wherever you live to help stop an SNP majority in May.”
A Police Scotland spokesman suggested that the SNP Government is to blame for this lack of nationality data. He said: “The recording of the nationality of an individual suspected linked to a crime report is not mandatory under the Scottish Crime Recording Standards.”
Rapualla Ahmadze has been caged (Image: Police Scotland)
A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: “Under the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995, police can request the nationality of an individual, which is an operational matter for Police Scotland.”
Earlier this month, Syrian national Mohan Mageed was jailed for eight years after following a 21-year-old student as she walked home at night – and raping her in 2025. Rapualla Ahmadze, from Afghanistan, was jailed for nine years after raping a vulnerable teenager in Cooper Park in Elgin during August 2024.
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