Additional
Mark Hargreaves was appointed as Assistant Inspector within HMICS in September 2022.
Having joined Strathclyde Police in (July) 2000, Mark was posted to response policing in Maryhill in the North of Glasgow. In the early years of his police career he undertook a number of operational and support roles during this time in Glasgow and Lanarkshire.
Following promotion to Inspector he was posted to C3 Division, where he undertook the role of Duty Officer, primarily undertaking the role of Tactical Firearms Commander. Other roles performed at the rank of Inspector included the delivery of CT exercise programmes and Professional Standards Department as an Investigating Officer.
Prior to the formation of Police Scotland, and on promotion to Chief Inspector, he was involved in the preparation of the HR function for transition to a single national service, including the creation of a single SCOPE ICT system for Police Scotland, building on earlier experience. In the rank of Chief Inspector, he also performed the role of Area Commander at two subdivisions within the Greater Glasgow area.
On promotion to Superintendent, he assumed the Specialist Operations portfolio within Greater Glasgow Division during the delivery of the Commonwealth Games. From there he moved to a national role seeking to develop local policing and ensure an equitable service nationally as lead for the Local Policing Development Support Team.
Drawing on previous experience within the ICT sector, he led the re-purposing of an ICT strategy for core digital policing systems, leading to the establishment of the Digitally Enabled Policing Programme.
In 2017 he transferred to Professional Standards Department, taking over as Head of Department shortly thereafter on promotion to Chief Superintendent prior to transferring to Ayrshire Division, where he assumed the role of Divisional Commander.
He has also undertaken a number of specialist roles in addition to substantive roles above, and has accumulated significant experience in event management, public order and firearms command. This experience resulted in his appointment in 2019 as the Silver Commander for the Euro 2020 Football Tournament in Scotland, and Operation Urram, the name given to the policing of the United Nations Conference of the Parties 26 (COP26), the largest policing operation ever undertaken in Scotland, which took place in November 2021.
Following the delivery of Operation Urram, Mark has led on a number of strategic work streams, such as a review of Rank Ratios and Middle Office, and on the work of Police Scotland to tackle sexism and misogyny in the workplace.