Justice Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, October 29, 2019

Official Report 618KB pdf

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Subordinate Legislation

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Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014 (Supplementary Provision) Order 2019 [Draft]

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Victim Surcharge (Scotland) Regulations 2019 [Draft]

Item 3 is consideration of two affirmative instruments. I welcome the Cabinet Secretary for Justice, Humza Yousaf, and his officials from the Scottish Government: Zak Tuck, who is victims and witnesses team leader; Pam Stott, who is victims and witnesses policy adviser; and Craig McGuffie, who is director of legal services.

I refer members to paper 3, which is a note by the clerk, and paper 4, which is a private paper. I invite the cabinet secretary to make a short opening statement.

I thank the committee for inviting me to give evidence in support of the affirmative instruments that are needed to introduce the victim surcharge and the victim surcharge fund. First, I acknowledge that it has taken longer than anticipated to lay these instruments. The time taken has been necessary to ensure that the scheme is administratively efficient, legally competent and enforceable, and—important—that it will provide help to victims of crime at the point of need.

The work that was undertaken to get us to this point included seeking an order under the Scotland Act 1998 to enable recovery of the surcharge through a deduction from an offender’s benefits. The order came into force in July this year, enabling us to lay these regulations now. We also had to address an issue whereby the surcharge could potentially have been interpreted as a fine. If we had left that matter unresolved, it could have resulted in the imposition of the surcharge being challenged—for example, where there are maximum fines in place for specific offences.

We are committed to putting victims at the heart of our justice system and making sure that their voices are heard. Building on the positive measures that were introduced through the Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014, we have delivered a range of initiatives to support victims and witnesses. For example, we introduced the Vulnerable Witnesses (Criminal Evidence) (Scotland) Act 2019, which ensures that more child witnesses are able to pre-record evidence ahead of jury trials. We have also set up a dedicated task force, as the committee knows, to listen to victims’ experiences, and we are investing in a new service to provide dedicated support for families that are bereaved by crime.

Over the past five years, we have invested more than £155 million to improve support for victims and their families and to provide compensation to victims who have sustained a criminal injury in Scotland. That includes funding for Victim Support Scotland’s victims fund, which provides practical support to victims in the aftermath of crime.

With regard to the victim surcharge, we know that experiencing crime can be an isolating and frightening experience, and it is only right that criminals should pay towards helping victims to recover and move on with their lives. The instruments before the committee today will enable that to happen. The victim surcharge will be imposed on individuals who are sentenced to pay a court fine. The amount of surcharge imposed will be proportionate to the value of the fine. The surcharge will be collected by the courts in the same way as fines and compensation orders are collected, and transferred to the Scottish Government to be banked in the victim surcharge fund. As set out in the regulations, no awards will be made from the fund until after 25 May 2020, in order to allow time for money to accumulate.

Victim support organisations will be able to apply to the Government for a share of the fund to cover the costs of providing short-term and practical support such as new windows and locks for victims of housebreaking or funeral expenses for families of murder victims.

This model, whereby the Government administers the fund, will ensure that victim support organisations can focus on doing what they do best—supporting victims of crime in communities across Scotland. The model also ensures that victims can access quick support at the point of need from those best placed to help them.

In terms of likely income from the surcharge, we estimate that around £100,000 could be collected within the first 12 months of the surcharge being in operation. That could reach a steady state of around £800,000 per year after four to five years of operation.

The regulations also state that we will prepare and publish guidance for applicants on the operation of the fund, which will cover topics such as assessment criteria for awards and what the fund can and cannot be used for. This has been shared with victim support organisations, to seek their feedback and to ensure that the application and award process is as efficient and effective as possible. That engagement will continue as we move towards finalising the document, which we will publish no later than May next year.

The support that will be provided through the victim surcharge fund will mean that victims and their families have one less thing to worry about at what is already a traumatic time. In supporting these regulations, the committee will ensure that the money raised through the surcharge can make a real difference to victims and their families. As always, I am happy to take questions.

We will start with a question from Liam Kerr.

Cabinet secretary, can you tell us about the thinking around restricting the surcharge to those paying a court fine? I think that I heard you say that it is to do with the surcharge not being an extra penalty. Will you elaborate on that and on how the surcharge is calculated—the method behind it?

Thank you for the question. First, we will continue to keep things under review. It is important that, not just when the surcharge has come into force but when the fund is distributing money, we should be open minded—and we will be open minded—about potential ways to improve, strengthen, widen and expand the process.

Secondly, the surcharge is attached to those who receive a court fine because the courts already have a mechanism in place to collect court fines and are very good at it; 88 per cent of fines are collected or part collected. There will be no discretion in that, so if someone receives a court fine, the victim surcharge comes on top of that.

Imposing an additional surcharge on top of a court fine should not be a hugely cumbersome process and the mechanisms are there to allow that to happen. If, for example, the surcharge was not related to offences that carry a court fine, the collection of the money would involve a whole new process, which could involve further delay. I reiterate that we should be open to any suggestions that are made. However, aligning the surcharge to court fines carried support in the consultation.

The second part of the question, if I understood it correctly, was about the amount that is payable. In the draft guidance, we consider how much the surcharge, which will be proportionate to the fine, will be. That work has been done on the back of the consultation that we had. I was discussing the matter with my officials before I came to the meeting. I mentioned in my opening statement that we have shared the draft guidance with victim support organisations and so on. I see no harm in sharing the draft guidance with the committee as well, if the committee is interested in looking at it and giving us its thoughts.

The surcharge will be proportionate to the value of the fine. My officials might want to add something on the proportionality of the surcharge and issues to do with the level of the surcharge compared with the original fine.

Part of the reason for going down that route was that we used the standard fine scale in Scotland and could map the surcharge on to that, to ensure that it would be proportionate. The committee might have noticed the change once we go above the statutory maximum fine: the surcharge is set at a percentage of the total fine rather than an amount, to ensure that when that high level of fine is reached, the proportionate approach is maintained.

Let us take that to the logical next step. Cabinet secretary, you said that 88 per cent of fines are collected, and we talk about the surcharge being “proportionate”. How do you envisage the courts dealing with the ability of a person to pay a financial penalty once the surcharge is introduced? That could obviously have an impact on the 88 per cent figure.

11:15  

It should not do. Part of the reason why we have aligned the amount to court fines is that the courts have a mechanism in place. Of course, we want that percentage to be even higher, and work is taking place around that.

The surcharge will not place an extra or significant burden on the courts in collecting court fines. The order that we required from the UK Government will, I hope, help with that, as it will mean that fines and surcharges can be directly collected from benefits, which is hugely important. That order, under section 104 of the Scotland Act 1998, means that we can make a deduction from an offender’s social security benefits. That existed for the victim surcharge in England and Wales, but it did not extend to the new victim surcharge in Scotland. The new order from the Westminster Government allows us to do that. I do not think that that will place an undue burden on the courts, and I expect collection rates to remain steady—indeed, I hope that they increase.

In your opening remarks, you said that the Scottish Government would administer the system, rather than any victim support organisation, to allow those organisations to do what they do best. Will you outline in more detail what would be involved in the Scottish Government’s administration?

The approach allows organisations to get on with doing the victim support element of their work. When we think about victim support, we often think about national organisations such as Victim Support Scotland—and I do not doubt that Victim Support will have an interest in the fund—but there might be a number of smaller organisations that do not have a huge amount of resource that they can divert to the administration of a fund. Victim Support Scotland is a relatively large organisation, but getting smaller organisations, particularly in more rural locations, to divert resource into the administration of a fund would not be the best use of that resource. That is why the Scottish Government will step in.

To answer your question a bit more directly, the approach will allow for Scottish Government oversight of the fund. We disburse a number of funds under a number of Government portfolios, so we have a robust application process.

May I stop you there? You are answering the question that is on my printed sheet, but not the question that I asked you. I asked whether you could outline exactly what would be involved in the Scottish Government administering the fund. There is obviously a cost: perhaps that cost can be broken down into its component parts.

For organisations that make applications to the fund, up to 5 per cent of their application can be for the costs that might fall to them for their part of the administration of the fund.

Let me see whether the details of the costs to the Scottish Government are in the business and regulatory impact assessment—the BRIA. I am sure that they will be there. I do not see it as being overly burdensome for us to administer the fund. Victims organisations can apply to the fund.

I have now found some of the costs involved, as set out in the BRIA. For the Scottish Government:

“There would be a cost associated with fulfilling the role of operator of the VSF ... Recurring costs—We estimate this cost will be approximately £26,000 per annum and will be recouped from the VSF as an outlay occurred in administration in terms of section 253G(4)(d) of the 1995 Act.”

There will also be an estimated cost to the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service, some non-recurring costs and some recurring annual costs. That is all laid out in the BRIA.

According to the BRIA, the role of operator

“would require staff time to account for funds received from SCTS, processing of applications from VSOs for payment from the VSF, record keeping, oversight and reporting.”

Who in the Scottish Government will do that?

I do not think that I can give you a name.

Will there be ministerial input or will it be regulated purely by the civil service?

As the guardians of public money, ministers always have to sign off applications. However, applications go through a rigorous process first; ministers sign them off at the final stage. Perhaps Zak Tuck can provide a bit more detail.

My team—the victims and witnesses policy team in the Scottish Government’s criminal justice division—will administer the fund. We will open up the fund to applications from victim support organisations. They will have to fill in an application form, which we will assess, as we do currently with applications for grant funding. There will be criteria for organisations to meet and they will need to demonstrate that they have a track record of supporting victims of crime. There will also be the usual due diligence and finance checks. If organisations satisfy the process, we will move to recommending that they are given a share of the victim surcharge fund, which they can use as they see fit to support victims.

At the stage of us having done our official assessment, a paper outlining our recommendations on how we disburse the funding will normally then go to the cabinet secretary. That process will be open and transparent, and it will be in the guidance, which will be shared by the end of May 2020.

Officially, the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service will have a key role to play and the Scottish Government will liaise with it. SCTS has said that the set-up costs will include those of the case management system and that progress is being made on that. Will you update the committee on progress? Is it reliant on information technology being improved or replaced?

We do not have anyone from the courts service here today, but my understanding is that the SCTS needs to make some changes to its database and fine-collection processes. At the moment, it does not collect the surcharge, so a new process is needed to enable that to happen. SCTS has estimated that there will be a one-off set-up cost of £22,000.

In its submission to the committee, SCTS has confirmed that all will be in place for 25 November, which is the coming-into-force date. It has also flagged up recurring costs from the additional time that it will take the courts to impose the surcharge on people. It has estimated that that will take one minute per case, which works out at about £135,000 per year. That funding will not come from the victim surcharge fund, so we will be looking for a separate income stream to cover those costs for the courts.

You mentioned that there is no one here from the SCTS. As part of the administration, Scottish Government staff time will be required to receive the funds from SCTS and, to avoid any hitches, I imagine that you are keen to have an indication that the SCTS case management system is progressing, even at this stage. After all, we are talking about the roll-out of the collection of the surcharge in November. It would be helpful if you could provide an update, perhaps in other evidence, on exactly where we are with that, because it seems key to the whole process.

Before I move on, will VSS and other organisations be allowed to keep any unused surplus to use as and when they need it? They are keen to know.

I have not looked at that issue in great detail and I need to look at whether, accounting-wise, that could be done or whether the funds would have to come back to the general pot and organisations would have to reapply. However, as the money is there for a set purpose, I am happy to explore whether it could be kept by victims organisations for that purpose. For transparency’s sake, if nothing else, I will have to go back and speak to finance officials about whether the various regulations would allow that.

That would be helpful, as organisations were keen to know whether they could bank those funds and use them as and when required.

Cabinet secretary, in your opening statement you said that support for victims should be at the heart of the justice system, which I agree is absolutely correct. Will you explain, then, why provision has not been made to allow victims to apply directly to the fund?

The proposals that we have set out would offer a much quicker—and, frankly, easier—way for victims to apply to the fund, as opposed to the Government disbursing funds directly to them. I respect your reason for asking the question—there is a legitimate argument to be made for the view that you express—but I think that direct application to the fund would potentially take longer for victims of crime.

The Government’s alternative suggestion is that a pot of money should go to organisations such as VSS, which work with victims day in and day out, know their circumstances really well and are able to make decisions on a quick turnaround—perhaps within 48 hours. That would allow money to be got to victims—for example, to pay invoices for fixing broken locks or even for funeral expenses—within a very short timeframe.

Of course, the Government does not necessarily have a direct relationship with victims of crime, therefore if it were to administer the fund it would have to undertake a rigorous due diligence process, which would have to be done centrally. That would add time to the process, which would not be good for victims. I respect your very legitimate reason for asking your question, but our proposed approach will see victims benefit in a much shorter timescale.

Just to be clear, if a victim wanted to make an application, would they have to apply to a victim support organisation, or would such an organisation apply to the fund on the victim’s behalf?

Twice a year, the fund will be open for victim support organisations to make bids. Once those applications for funding have been granted, victims will approach such organisations, which will have pots of money sitting there, open for victims’ applications. Our current thinking—of course, the guidance is currently in draft form—is that the process will open twice a year, but we will keep that under review. Therefore it is proposed that victim support organisations will have pots of money made available to them and victims will then approach such organisations.

So a victim support organisation will have a pot of money and a victim will make their application to such an organisation, which will sign it off and authorise the money to go to the victim.

Yes, that is correct.

Will you give examples of victim support organisations that will be able to administer the pots of funds that you have described?

We will try to make the criteria as wide as possible. At the same time, we must undertake a fair degree of due diligence, as the committee would expect us to do.

Again, the matter will be covered in the draft guidance, which I will share with the committee, through the convener. However, I can say that, for example, we would want such organisations to have a track record of providing services to victims of crime, or providing treatment that is intended to benefit their physical or mental wellbeing, over at least a two-year period. We would also want to look at an organisation’s aims and objectives, to see that it had a clear focus on providing support to victims. We are also considering asking questions about the approximate number of victims that an organisation might help, the geographical area that it might cover and so on.

We are trying to make the process as open as possible, so that organisations that are distinct from those that are set up purely for victim support may apply. I will give an example: a number of racial equality councils across the country do a plethora of work, across a range of issues, some of which might involve supporting victims of crime who are from ethnic minority backgrounds, who might not normally go to other services. Such organisations are not set up specifically for such work but have a proven track record of helping victims of crime. In such cases, the victims are from ethnic minorities, but the same might be said of many other organisations in relation to other protected characteristics.

We are trying to make the criteria as wide as possible, while ensuring that the obvious due diligence processes that would be expected of the Government are carried out.

Okay, thank you.

I would like to flip James Kelly’s question around and ask the cabinet secretary to give examples of organisations that might not qualify for the fund, although I am not sure whether he will be able to do so today. For example, might the Miscarriages of Justice Organisation Scotland not qualify—or are you unable to provide such detail at this time?

11:30  

We would not want to prejudge applications. Jenny Gilruth mentioned the Miscarriages of Justice Organisation. I have met the organisation a couple of times and know it well. Members will know that Willie Rennie is a director of the organisation, and I have met him on occasion to discuss the good work that it does.

I am not sure that we could say that MOJO helps victims of crime. It helps victims of miscarriages of justice, but I am not entirely sure that that would fall under the criteria in the draft guidelines, although we are trying to design those criteria to be as open as possible.

We are talking about victims of crime, and the surcharge comes from offenders who have had a court fine imposed on them because they have committed a crime that had a victim at the other end of it. I am not focusing on MOJO, but the help would have to be specifically for victims of crime.

In your opening statement, you said that you would be happy to share the draft guidance. Can you give an outline of what might be covered, and what might not be covered, in relation to the counselling of victims in particular? Do you imagine that financial support would be provided for that?

I will give a bit more detail on the guidance and would welcome feedback from members of the committee. Counselling is the exact type of support that could be covered.

I am talking about making the victim surcharge as open as possible, but the one caveat to that is, if there are other funds that are legally obligated to assist victims of crime, a victim should go to those funds first. If they are not covered, the victim surcharge should then come in and be able to help. That means that the victim surcharge is not just plugging a gap that home insurance or the Department for Work and Pensions should cover. For example, broken locks in a housing association property should be the responsibility of the housing association and the victim surcharge should not fill that gap; it should cover genuine gaps.

The member will be aware that we have funeral grants and so on—other funds exist. The one caveat is, where there is a legal obligation on another institution or organisation, that should be the first port of call.

I am almost going to contradict myself now. The victim surcharge could be disbursed relatively quickly. A victims organisation could do that within 48 hours, whereas a housing association, for example, might take longer to fix a lock. In such cases, we would have to be open and flexible.

What you said about counselling is reassuring. I imagine that there is an obligation on the national health service to provide that. How does that square up?

I am not sure that there is a statutory obligation on the NHS to provide counselling for victims of crime per se. People can be referred by their general practitioner after a particularly traumatic crime.

I worked for the late Bashir Ahmad. When he was an MSP, he was the victim of a mugging, which had a profound effect on him. It was a relatively low-level offence—he was not too badly injured, thankfully, and they did not get too much off him—although I know that these things are all relative. You would not necessarily get NHS counselling for that, but I know that it shook Bashir at the time. Something like that might be traumatic for an individual and they might want to speak to somebody about it.

Where the NHS might not be able to offer counselling—it might take a while because there is a waiting list and other priorities, for example—it would be possible for the victim surcharge fund to cover that.

I am trying to be as open as I can be with the member. We are genuinely looking to ensure that we are not restrictive with the fund, but where there is a legal obligation on others to provide assistance in emergency situations, victims should go there first. The money from the surcharge should be used as widely as possible to fill some gaps.

In your opening statement, you talked about the estimate of how much will be in the fund—I think that you said that it would be £800,000 a year after four or five years. I want a bit more information on that estimate. Is it based on full recovery, or does it take into account non-payment of some of the penalties, for example? Obviously, non-payment will impact on the level of the fund, so it would be useful to know what the estimate is based on. Is it based on actual payments made? That is, if the fund is £800,000 per year after four or five years, do you expect all that money to go out each year, or would that sum be a running total? When do you expect the first payments to be made?

Thank you for those questions. It is important to put on the record that the figures are estimates. They are not absolutely scientific but based on the current collection rates. The member will be aware that currently we have not only court fines but compensation orders. The estimate is therefore based on the collection rate, which is relatively high, as I said in answer to Liam Kerr. The rate is about 88 per cent at present, but we obviously want it to be higher.

We estimate that there will be £800,000 in the fund after four or five years and we would expect that money to be fully disbursed to organisations. However, that depends on the level of applications that come to us. If the applications were not at the expected level, we would not disburse it all. However, I do not expect there to be any difficulty with organisations coming forward for the amount that we will have.

Forgive me, but what was your last question?

It was about how quickly the first payments will go out.

The plan is to allow six months for the money to accumulate. We expect the first payments to be made six months from the fund coming into operation, which we expect to happen in late spring or early summer next year.

Mr Tuck referred earlier to costs. I presume that the estimate for the fund takes into account the fact that costs will have been covered. The sum of £135,000 for the SCTS was mentioned, with the indication that a separate income stream would cover that, which would not come from the surcharge. What is that separate income stream?

It will be Scottish Government funding. Rather than taking the money from the surcharge fund, whose purpose is obviously to benefit victims, it would come from other, separate core grant funding.

Okay. So any money raised from the surcharge would go out to victims.

Yes.

I was going to ask about the effect on the administration requirements of victim support organisations, but that point was covered in an answer to an earlier question. I am aware that the surcharge fund is part of a much wider programme of support for victims of crime. Are there any precedents for such a fund? Does any other country do it?

Yes. England and Wales have a surcharge fund, and there are examples in other countries. The point is that it is just one tool in a suite of measures that we have to bring forward. We have brought in a number of positive changes to how victims are treated, which I think has been recognised—the committee has played an important role in that in terms of legislation. We know from victims that the victim surcharge fund will go a long way towards addressing the practical impacts that they have to deal with, particularly for some of the most heinous crimes that are committed. For example, in relation to the homicide statistics that have come out today, the families of those victims should not have to worry about funeral costs on top of the grief and trauma that they are already dealing with. The surcharge fund will be an important tool in our support for victims, although, as I said, it is just one tool in a suite of measures that we are looking to bring forward.

I am sure that it is a very welcome one.

Good morning, cabinet secretary. We know that rates and types of offending can be different in different places, so how will the Scottish Government ensure that communities across the country can benefit from the fund?

That is an important point. Frankly, the only way to do that is to monitor the situation. In the draft guidance—I will, of course, share it—we ask what geographical areas organisations provide support to. That will allow us to monitor which geographies are covered. Some national organisations such as Victim Support Scotland will have an interest. I have known VSS since before I became cabinet secretary, and I have been to its volunteers conference, so I know that it covers a wide geographical area.

We are well aware of and will keep a close eye on the geographical element. For example, a victim of crime in an island community will incur certain expenses and costs that would not be faced if they were in Glasgow or any other city on the mainland. We will monitor the situation closely and, if geographic gaps exist, we will have conversations with organisations in those areas to see whether we can encourage them to apply to the fund.

Has the Government done any analysis of the potential impact on sentencing of the introduction of the surcharge, given the restorative nature of the measure? [Interruption.] I am sorry—I have the cold that has been round my whole family. Has there been any analysis of its potential impact in relation to sheriffs who might be thinking of giving out a community disposal? Might there even be an impact on custodial sentences?

There is nothing in the modelling work that we have done to suggest that it would shift the sentencing behaviour of sheriffs or judges. Members will be aware that things such as compensation orders already exist, and I have seen no suggestion that that there would be a shift in sentencing behaviour—perhaps officials will tell me otherwise. Remember that the measure relates to court fines, which can also be applied to community payback orders and the like. I do not see there being any particular shift, but I understand the logic behind the question. Are officials aware of anything that would affect shrieval behaviour?

No, but it is something that we will monitor and keep an eye on.

Given that there may be some concerns about the geographical spread of the fund, might the Government consider relinquishing its administrative role to an organisation such as VSS, once the process is up and running and you are satisfied that it is working properly?

We always keep things under review, but I am keen that victims organisations—even an organisation of the size and scale of VSS, which is capable of administering and running funds—should concentrate on the support element. Also, although I expect VSS to be around for a long time and we are happy to support and fund it for a variety of different projects, organisations can come and go and we want to make sure that funds such as the victim surcharge fund have stability, which is so crucial and important for victims.

I am not ruling out the convener’s suggestion. When we review any fund, we should always be open minded so that we ensure that we are getting the best out of it. However, I do not envisage the position changing in the near future.

11:45  

Agenda item 4 is formal consideration of the motion in relation to the draft Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014 (Supplementary Provision) Order 2019. The Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee has considered and reported on the draft order and had no comment on it.

Motion moved,

That the Justice Committee recommends that the Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014 (Supplementary Provision) Order 2019 [draft] be approved.—[Humza Yousaf].

Motion agreed to.

Agenda item 5 is formal consideration of the motion on the draft Victim Surcharge (Scotland) Regulations 2019. The Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee has considered and reported on the draft order and had no comment on it.

Motion moved,

That the Justice Committee recommends that the Victim Surcharge (Scotland) Regulations 2019 [draft] be approved.—[Humza Yousaf]

Motion agreed to.

That concludes our consideration of these affirmative instruments. The committee’s report will note and confirm the outcome of the debate. Is the committee agreed to delegate authority to me as convener to clear the final draft of the report?

Members indicated agreement.

I thank the cabinet secretary and his officials for attending the committee.

11:47 Meeting suspended.  

11:47 On resuming—  

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Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (Investigations: Code of Practice) (Scotland) Order 2019 [Draft]

Agenda item 6 is consideration of a further affirmative instrument. I welcome back Humza Yousaf, Cabinet Secretary for Justice and his officials from the Scottish Government: Alan Nicholson, who is proceeds of crime policy adviser; and Isobel Joiner, who is from the directorate for legal services. I refer members to paper 5, which is a note by the clerk, and I invite the cabinet secretary to make a short opening statement on the instrument.

Thank you, convener, for giving me the opportunity to speak briefly on the draft order.

Section 410 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 requires Scottish ministers to prepare, consult on and publish a code of practice on the functions of the proper person. A “proper person” is defined in section 412 of POCA as: a constable, an officer of Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs or an immigration officer, in relation to a confiscation or money laundering investigation; or the Scottish ministers or a person named by them, in relation to a civil recovery, detained cash, detained property or frozen fund investigation.

The order proposes to bring into operation a revised code of practice for the exercise by proper persons in Scotland of the investigative functions conferred on them by sections 380, 382, 387, 397 and 404 of POCA. Those sections provide, respectively, for the exercising of orders and warrants in relation to: production orders; orders to grant entry; search warrants; customer information orders; and account monitoring orders.

Those orders and warrants allow the proper person to require an individual or company to provide information that is of significant value to an investigation, or indeed to search for such information. The powers allow the proper person to fully exercise their functions under chapter 3 of part 8 of POCA.

A code of practice has been in operation for 16 years and was last revised in 2009. Although there has been no material change to the legislation that would require a re-issue of the code, we have taken the opportunity to strengthen the code, which makes more comprehensive and enhanced guidance available to proper persons.

The revisions simply include more detailed guidance on each of the individual orders, including procedures for serving orders and the copying and retention of materials. The new code also includes more thorough advice to proper persons on legal privilege and on the statutory requirements for customer information orders and account monitoring orders.

The revisions provide additional guidance for practitioners on how to comply with the requirements in exercising their functions under the 2002 act lawfully, proportionately and consistently. In turn, that will provide the public with confidence that the exercise of those functions is carried out fairly and with integrity and respect. As ever, I am happy to answer any questions that members may have.

Members have no questions for the cabinet secretary, so we will move on to agenda item 7, which is formal consideration of the motion on the instrument. The Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee has considered and reported on the instrument and had no comment on it.

Motion moved,

That the Justice Committee recommends that the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (Investigations: Code of Practice) (Scotland) Order 2019 [draft] be approved.—[Humza Yousaf]

Motion agreed to.

That concludes our consideration of the instrument. The committee’s report will note and confirm the outcome of the debate. Is the committee agreed to delegate authority to me as convener to clear the final draft of the report?

Members indicated agreement.

I thank the cabinet secretary and his officials for attending the committee.

11:52 Meeting suspended.  

11:53 On resuming—  

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Enforcement of Fines (Relevant Penalty) (Scotland) Order 2019 SSI 2019/280

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Victim Surcharge Fund (Prescribed Relatives) (Scotland) Regulations 2019 SSI 2019/282

Agenda item 8 is consideration of two negative instruments. I refer members to paper 6, which is a note by the clerk. The Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee has considered and reported on the instruments and had no comments on them. Is the committee agreed that it does not wish to make any recommendations in relation to the instruments?

Members indicated agreement.