Double whammy: Two senior Scottish Police Federation figures guilty of 'inappropriate and offensive' online comments ... Vice Chair brands Brexit backers 'slightly thick and slightly racist muppets' ... General Secretary targets female officer over sex crime allegation against acting Chief Constable Iain Livingstone ... Upheld complaints raise concerns that Scotland's national police force has become overly politicised

A SENIOR police union boss branded Brexit backers ‘slightly thick and slightly racist muppets’ in an astonishing social media attack.

Scottish Police Federation vice chair David Hamilton wrote on Twitter: “The Brexit Dream is Dying - Finally!

“How about we wake up, forget the whole idea and just get on with being good Europeans rather than listening to the slightly thick and slightly racist muppets who took us here and who now cling on to some bizarre Victorian Imperialist fantasy.”

Hamilton is a serving officer and full-time federation official who represents around 18,000 members across Scotland — many of whom back Brexit.

His comments prompted complaints to Police Scotland which were upheld in July 2018.

Chief Superintendent Mark Hargreaves, head of the force professional standards department, said: 'We received a number of complaints in relation to a tweet posted by a serving police officer. These complaints have been upheld.”

Chief Inspector Jacqui Campbell found the tweet to be ‘unacceptable, highly inappropriate, wholly offensive and not in keeping with impartiality rules whereby police officers must not take an active part in politics when discharging their duties’.

She added: “This is particularly pertinent given that on his personal Twitter account, Inspector Hamilton’s biography identifies him as vice chair of the Scottish Police Federation, representing 18,000 Scottish Police officers.”

Police Scotland regulations state that a ‘constable must at all time abstain from any activity which is likely to interfere with the impartial discharge of that constable’s duties of which is likely to give rise to the impression amongst members of the public that it may so interfere, and, in particular, a constable must not take an active part in politics'.

They also states that officers ‘will show respect for all people and their beliefs, values, cultures and individual needs’.

Scottish Conservative justice spokesman Liam Kerr said: “It is unacceptable for such a senior police figure to describe the one million Scots who voted for Brexit in this way.

“Representatives of the SPF do well to remember they are supposed to be politically neutral.

“There are more than enough problems with policing and justice in Scotland for Mr Hamilton to be focusing on without straying into this territory.”

Ukip Scottish leader David Coburn MEP said: “As one of the slightly thick and slightly racist muppets he appears to think we are, I take offence on behalf of the 38 per cent of Scots who also voted to leave. He should resign forthwith.

“Comments like this from a serving police officer in a senior position are not proper. He’s insulting a large minority of Scottish voters who he is supposed to be protecting.”

Hamilton — brother of former SNP MSP Duncan Hamilton — prompted an online backlash, with one English officer tweeting: "As a serving police officer who voted leave I find this tweet disgusting. I am neither thick nor racist and I'm glad you're not vice chair of our federation.”

Another wrote: “Well that's your colours pinned firmly to the SNP mast. And here's me thinking that Police Scotland should be a politically impartial organisation. Mass centralisation is obviously working for your political masters when they have lapdogs like you involved.”

After deleting the tweet, Hamilton said: “I have decided to remove my tweet. It has been misused out of context too many times.

“It was never about ‘all Leave voters’ as an entity, each of whom will have had their own reasons for voting as they did.”

Asked to comment on the complaints against him being upheld, he said: “News to me.”

The 2016 referendum saw 38 per cent of Scots voters, numbering more than one million, back Leave.

In June, Police Scotland upheld a separate complaint against SPF general secretary Calum Steele over his own ‘inappropriate and offensive’ Tweets.

He targeted female former senior officer Angela Wilson after she questioned whether a previous sexual assault claim should disqualify Iain Livingstone from becoming chief constable.

Steele branded Wilson ‘one of the most incompetent imbeciles ever to have held rank in the police service’ and a ‘buffoon’.

He also alleged that a corruption inquiry ‘extended’ to Wilson but Chief Inspector Campbell confirmed that she was ‘never investigated for corruption’.

Despite Steele’s messages being from a personal account, Campbell found ‘they are directly related to his role as a police officer and particularly his role as general secretary’.

She told Wilson: “Having considered all of the available information I am satisfied Constable Steele’s tweets have been inappropriate and offensive to you in the circumstances described.

“Furthermore, I am satisfied the tweets were posted while Constable Steele was on duty and as such, and in the balance of probabilities, your complaint of incivility is upheld.

“We have asked Constable Steele to remove the relevant tweets from his Twitter account. Unfortunately, it is how own personal Twitter account and as such we are unable to order him to remove or delete them.

“I would like to offer you a sincere apology for the undoubted upset Constable Steele’s actions have caused you.”

However — in a bizarre development — Steele’s lawyer Callum Anderson claimed it would be false, inaccurate and even defamatory to say the complaint against Steele had been ‘upheld’.

Versions of these stories were first published in the Scottish Daily Mail and Sunday Mail newspapers