She said the “judicial system” was “very inefficient” compared to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) south of the border, with overtime on officers unnecessarily attending court adding up to £3 million in the past year.

The plans to not deal fully with 101 calls are intended to enable a focus on “frontline policing”, including investigations of organised crime, cyber offences, fraud and sexual abuse of children.

Ms Farrell also promised to cut time spent on mental health calls and to direct those in distress to “third party support” but said provisions were a “postcode lottery”.

She said she welcomed the work done by sheriffs principal at Glasgow and Dundee to improve court efficiencies but said changes were being made fast enough.

Ms Farrell said: “A roads policing officer said to me in the early weeks I was here, each time that case gets adjourned it’s the victim of the case who says to the police ‘Why is this happening?’.

“Their lives have been disrupted and their lives have been put on hold. What I’ve observed is a system that’s very inefficient. That is having a significant impact on policing, it is not joined up at all.”

A spokesperson for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service said: “We work with Police Scotland, and the courts service who schedule trials, to have witness availability taken into account when trials are fixed. We also work with the police to ensure that cases are ready to proceed.

“COPFS believes effective case management has the capacity to transform the experience of witnesses in the justice system and reduce unnecessary attendance.”

A spokesperson for the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (SCTS) said: “In the modern system, the evidence of the police and professional witnesses can be taken remotely, without the need for them to attend court.

“The Summary Case Management Pilot, which is now established in Hamilton, Paisley, Dundee, Glasgow and Perth, aims to reduce the number of cases that are set down for trial unnecessarily and to reduce the volume of late pleas of guilty and late decisions on discontinuation by the early disclosure of evidence and early judicial case management.”