Pressure is growing on the police to explain the use of mounted officers in the north and north-east after it emerged the unit clocked up enough miles to circle the world four times.
Figures obtained under freedom of information (FoI) show the Ayrshire-based unit travelled 103,581 miles around the Scotland in the year after the creation of Police Scotland, at a cost of £1.5million.
The revelation has spurred criticism over use of horses on the streets of places like Inverness and Aberdeen when former regional forces did not regard them as necessary.
The FoI data also shows the unit – most commonly used in relation to crowd control and significant public disorder – recorded 769 road traffic offences, such as failing to wear a seatbelt or using a mobile phone while driving. In comparison, it recorded 425 anti-social behaviour offences.
Scottish Liberal Democrat justice spokeswoman Alison McInnes said while it was right the unit should be available to deal with serious trouble or big events, people will be surprised that “officers on horses” have recorded more traffic offences than those involving anti-social behaviour.
“Having clocked up over 100,000 miles in a year, the equivalent of four times around the world, I have to question whether this is really the best use of resources,” the North-east MSP said.
“This overzealous and costly deployment of the unit smacks of nothing more than being seen to share the resources for the sake of it rather than operational necessity.”
She added: “Police Scotland needs to explain why it believes the use of horses on the streets of places such as Orkney and Inverness is necessary, given that the local police managed fine without them before.”