Police Scotland has pledged to ensure its buildings are “fit for purpose” following concerns over a maintenance bill amounting to more than £260m over the next decade.

The Liberal Democrats said details released under Freedom of Information laws showed the cost of upkeep for buildings and also maintaining the force’s mechanical and electrical systems amounted to £262,952,116.

Liam McArthur, the party’s justice spokesman, said the “huge bill” had come about as part of the “botched centralisation” of the force by the Scottish Government.

Mr McArthur said: “We’ve seen reports of police cars held together with duct tape, leaking interview rooms and officers searching charity shops for gear. Now this Freedom of Information request reveals that, over the next ten years, the cost of routine maintenance of the police estate will be more than a quarter of a billion pounds.

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“That is a huge bill and it is what is required just to keep up, replacing outdated electrical equipment and buildings. It will not even begin to cover the new investment that is required to ensure officers and staff have the 21st century resources they need.”

Police Scotland Deputy Chief Constable Iain Livingstone said the total was the amount the force would have to pay “if we were simply to maintain our current estate”.

But he insisted that was not the intention, and that the Policing 2026 Strategy had set out “ambitious plans to build the police service Scotland needs for the future”.

In its response to the Lib Dems, Police Scotland said the estimated spending on maintenance included replacing “components and systems assessed against the anticipated lifecycle” that may be required over the next ten years.

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Mr McArthur said: “Officers and staff do a fantastic job under very tough circumstances in keeping our communities safe, but the SNP’s botched centralisation continues to undermine their efforts.”

The Scottish Government merged Scotland’s eight regional police forces into one national organisation in April 2013, but Mr McArthur said the projected savings from the move had “not been realised”, while problems with the development of the new i6 IT system “continue to deprive frontline policing of resources”.

He said: “That is why Liberal Democrats have proposed extra investment in the police, dropping the VAT bill incurred through the SNP’s centralisation and ending the public sector pay cap so staff and officers get the boost they deserve.”

Mr Livingstone said: “The Police Scotland estate was inherited from the legacy arrangements of eight forces and the Scottish Police Services Authority.

“Much of the estate had not been maintained or upgraded to an adequate standard, in addition, a number of the buildings are no longer suitable for the demands or needs of local communities.

“The figures we have released are the maintenance costs we would expect to pay out over the next 10 years if we were simply to maintain our current estate; however, that is not our intention, and through the Policing 2026 Strategy, which was approved by the SPA and placed before the Scottish Parliament this week, we laid out ambitious plans to build the police service Scotland needs for the future.

“These plans detail our intention to ensure Police Scotland becomes financially and operationally sustainable within three years.

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“As part of these plans, Police Scotland is now developing an estate investment programme to ensure we have buildings which are fit for purpose across the wide range of communities we serve.

“The actual amount Police Scotland will spend on estates over the next ten years will be calculated and refined as this investment programme is developed to ensure we continue to deliver a quality service to local communities. This will ensure we use our budget as effectively as possible in delivering a quality service to communities across Scotland.”

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: “We are committed to protecting the £1bn police resource budget in real terms in every year of this Parliament, a boost of £100m by 2021.

“We have also increased the capital budget in real terms in 2017-18 and provided a further £61m to support the delivery of Policing 2026, the ten-year strategy to ensure Police Scotland is equipped to tackle new and emerging threats.

“We will continue to press UK ministers over the glaring disparity on VAT which sees Police Scotland, unlike all other UK territorial police forces, unable to recover VAT.

“Police and fire services in Scotland have already paid more than £140m in VAT since 2013 and we welcome support for a fair deal for Scotland’s emergency services.”