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Without further ado, we begin our consideration of the budget process. Members have indicated that they are interested in various areas of activity. I ask Maureen Macmillan to start the proceedings.
Lord Advocate, you know that the committees have been interested in your change agenda for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. When you gave evidence to the committees in May, at stage 1 of the budget process, you said that your department was
In general, we are well down the road with the change agenda, but I think that I pointed out on the last occasion on which I met the committees that we will probably never reach the end of the process of implementing a change agenda. Nowadays in public service, one must always be alive to the possibilities of improvement. It has been an interesting feature of our change agenda that new areas have opened up.
There have been no unforeseen problems—everything is going smoothly.
I cannot remember off hand the problems that have arisen, but it is fair to say that they have not been insuperable and have all been addressed as they have arisen. I am very pleased with the way in which things have gone.
So you would say that the staff are now fully involved in the process of implementing change and are being consulted on it.
Yes, absolutely.
Just to tie off the issue of efficiency savings, are you in a position to say by what approximate percentage the cost of case parking has been reduced as the result of phase 1 of FOS?
The short answer is no. The efficiencies that are being achieved as a result of phase 1 have involved savings of 70 staff. We anticipate further savings in the next financial year.
I have a brief bit of housekeeping to deal with. My clerk has asked me to remind members that, at paragraph 2.3 of the note by the adviser, there is a wee misdescription of the financial year at three points: 2008-09 should read 2007-08.
I will stick with the subject of the future office system and the anticipated efficiency savings arising from that. I heard your response to Stewart Stevenson, Lord Advocate. Of the savings of 70 posts that you have achieved, how many were you expecting to achieve in 2004-05? Assumptions were made about savings in the budget and, as we indicated in our stage 1 report, we were keen for modernisation not to slow down simply because those targets were not being achieved. We recommended building in a contingency margin. I wonder whether that has been reflected in the budget.
I understand the recommendation that was made. To answer the first point, if I have understood it correctly—please correct me if I am wrong—there has been no change in the anticipated staff savings. We have worked on the basis that there will be savings of 70 posts—I will no doubt be corrected if I am wrong. We do not have a contingency as such. Obviously, we are a demand-led organisation. We try to anticipate what the future level of demand is going to be, and we respond to that. If we were to have a contingency, we would end up with the charge that we were not spending. There would also be end-year flexibility issues and so on, although EYF has now changed to CUP, whatever that stands for—central unallocated pot or something.
So if your savings are not realised for whatever reason, there is sufficient flexibility for that not to cause you any concern.
That is right.
Your budget has risen from £89.15 million in the current year to £101 million in 2007-08. Is there one thing that makes up the bulk of that increase? I see that the "Non-court" line has risen in particular. Is that increase for something specific, or is it to do with flexibility?
It is the flexibility and the assumptions that have been built into the forward planning.
Does Stewart Stevenson have a question?
My point has already been covered.
On efficiency savings, I note from your letter that you anticipate
Any efficiency savings are ours, and that is an incentive to make them. As far as rationalisation of estate is concerned, we anticipate a £500,000 rationalisation of estate in Edinburgh, reducing the number of offices from five to three, but those are recurring costs because they were for rent.
Is that over the full period?
Yes.
Given that your budget is rising, as Jackie Baillie said, from £89.15 million to £101.5 million in 2007-08 could you indicate whether your efficiency savings increase the amount of money available to you over and above what is in the budget, or is that is the ceiling?
That is the ceiling. I should perhaps point out that part of the increase is taken up with capital increase, which is largely allocated to the refurbishment of the Ballater Street office in Glasgow.
Could you repeat the first part of that sentence? I did not catch it.
You were asking about the increase, part of which relates to the increase in capital costs because of the desire to refurbish the Ballater Street office in Glasgow.
Yes, I understand that. That is why I was asking whether there was disposal of estate, but you clarified that by saying that there was simply the surrendering of leases.
When you gave evidence previously, Lord Advocate, one of the issues discussed was the impact on your department of the shift of business from the High Court down to the sheriff court. What impact has that had on your staff?
Of course, we prosecute in the High Court as well as in the sheriff court, so the work load is the same but is being prosecuted in the sheriff court rather than in the High Court. The difference is that, in the High Court, Crown counsel advocate deputes do the prosecution, whereas in the sheriff court, that is done by depute fiscals. The preparation of cases is the same—precognitions are done by Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service staff. Because the sheriff and jury and High Court procedure is the same as far as the processes go, there is an impact only in the sense that some more cases are being prosecuted by fiscal staff rather than by Crown counsel. As you have seen, there has been a large increase in the number of fiscals and lawyers over the past few years, so we are well able to cope with the increase in the sentencing powers of the sheriff.
So there is no real change, then. The fiscals have additional work, but you have provided extra fiscals to cope with that.
Yes.
At the other end of the scale, is there a lessening of work for Crown counsel?
There is a lessening of work, but in fact there have been more Crown counsel. You will recall that I reorganised Crown counsel into two parts—senior advocate deputes and trial deputes. The senior advocate deputes concentrate on particularly serious and complex cases that require more than the usual preparation time—cases that might require the services of someone who is more experienced in advocacy work. The senior advocate deputes were also given more time to prepare cases.
Has any discussion taken place about the possible implications of the McInnes review? If its recommendations went through, more business would transfer up from the bottom of the system, so to speak, to the sheriff court.
I am not sure that that would necessarily be the case. McInnes is a package of measures that a fiscal can offer in lieu of prosecution. The proposals include, for example, an increase in the use of fiscal fines and the introduction of compensation orders. If McInnes were to be enacted in its pure form, as it were, I anticipate that there would be an overall reduction in the number of cases that go to the summary court. In any event, the procedures in the district court are the same as those in the sheriff summary court. The same level of preparation and the same processes are involved in each case.
What does McInnes mean for you?
Frankly, it is a bit early to say. At the moment, what we have are only proposals. Indeed, I do not know what the Executive or Parliament's response to the proposals will be. Clearly, if the Parliament were to agree with McInnes on the proposal to increase the level of fiscal fines, for example, we would see a reduction in the number of cases that go to court and the prospect of greater efficiency savings.
Are you aware of a timetable for moving forward on McInnes?
I do not know whether the committee is to take evidence from Cathy Jamieson, but it would be better if that question were directed at her, if you do not mind. I know that discussions are on-going, but it is for her to say what—
So it is fair to say that, at this point in time, you have done nothing about, and have not taken cognisance of, McInnes.
I would not say that we have done nothing. A certain amount of scoping work has been done to look at the various scenarios. In response to your question, I simply speculated that, if the Parliament were minded to increase the level of fiscal fines, there would be a reduction in the number of cases that go to court. The follow-on from that would be greater efficiency savings. It would depend on which other parts of the package were to be introduced.
I have one further question.
I ask Margaret Mitchell to be brief, because she has had a fair chunk of questions.
The budget provides £1 million in 2006-07 and £2 million in 2007-08 for judicial pay and an increase in the judicial complement. What does that relate to?
Those figures are from the Justice Department's budget.
So you do not know about them and you are not aware of whether they result from the Bonomy report or anything else.
I know that an increase has been announced in the complement of senators in the High Court and the Court of Session from 32 to 34.
That is happening now.
You will have to ask the minister for a response, because I do not know whether included in the figures is that increase or something else, and I do not have the figures in front of me.
The figures are in the budget, but they are nothing on which you have a view.
I do not want to be unhelpful, but the matter is not my responsibility. If I responded, I would be speculating about the meaning of the figures. Officials co-operate and take account of the trends that they see. I know that officials have had much contact with the Justice Department and other relevant departments in setting the budget. However, if you are asking me what the figures mean, I cannot answer.
So you have no view at this point.
The transfer of business was a Bonomy recommendation. Recommendations were also made about preliminary hearings and managed meetings in other parts of the Bonomy review. When that was published, the Justice 1 Committee was debating the ability of the Crown Office and all the different elements, including the court, to co-ordinate diaries. A technological solution—an electronic diary—was suggested. Given the future office system project, has that proposal been progressed in any way? When the Justice 1 Committee discussed such a diary, work on it had not started, although it was one of the proposed ways of achieving efficiency savings.
The future office system is giving us the ability to do much with witnesses, for example. I cannot answer the question about co-ordinating the diaries of judges and defence counsel because I do not know the details of the discussions, but I know that they continue as part of the implementation package. I can say no more than that.
Do you have any detail on the likely timetable for concluding those discussions? The proposal was sold to us as a great boon that would generate efficiency savings because co-ordination would mean that meetings were not cancelled and double bookings did not take place. All the extra managed meetings and preliminary hearings would be doable because of that technological advancement.
Managed meetings are part of the package, as are early disclosure and other matters. It will be up to advocate deputes and counsel to arrange diaries so as to manage those meetings, whether they are face to face, by telephone, by e-mail or by another technological means. I am afraid that I do not have the details, so I cannot take that further.
The justice element of the Executive's programme is considerable. Quite a lot of new legislation, such as the Vulnerable Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2004, is coming through. Are you and your department satisfied that the budgetary implications of those bits of legislation have been fully accounted for?
Yes. Assumptions have been built in for that act and other pieces of legislation. Funding has been made available for them.
I want to follow up on that point. I presume that, when you talk about being happy that there is sufficient funding, you are talking about the information needs of victims, vulnerable witnesses and so on. Am I right in thinking that you are not responsible for the physical state of the court buildings, which represent another cost that, although not in your budget, could be in the Minister for Justice's budget?
That is true. I do not have any control over the physical state of the buildings.
Have you any dialogue with the Minister for Justice on that issue?
We have no dialogue on the issue at ministerial level although I am pretty sure that we have dialogue at official level.
To respond to that point, and to Mr Maxwell's point, I would say that a huge amount of work has been done to prepare for the introduction of the Bonomy reforms—for example, the work on vulnerable witnesses. There has been good co-operation among all the criminal justice partners.
So the Scottish Court Service is involved as well.
Yes.
Committee members have noted that the Executive has set a target of
For the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, some of the reforms have been structural—aligning its areas with police force areas and, in Glasgow, with the divisions. That has helped to change the culture of the relationship between the police and the Procurator Fiscal Service, which in turn has helped to develop a climate in which we can target persistent offenders. Various local offices have done that. For example, in Linlithgow a kind of hit list was drawn up of the 20 most persistent offenders. That enabled us to roll together all the outstanding cases and get people in front of the sheriff. The sheriff was therefore not dealing simply with one or two individual cases but was seeing more of a pattern. The future office system is also enabling us to make such improvements because it highlights outstanding cases against individuals. We therefore have a two-pronged approach using future office system and enhanced co-operation with the police through local initiatives. That approach will help us to play our part in meeting the target.
I take your point about the two-pronged approach. Are there hit lists not just in Linlithgow but in other areas?
Yes—I used Linlithgow simply as an example. Because we are targeting individuals, the work has to be done locally—agreements have to be reached between the Procurator Fiscal Service and the police—but, centrally, we are encouraging such developments. However, it is fair to say that individual fiscal offices and individual divisional commanders do not need a lot of encouragement because they want those developments anyway.
I want to consider the objectives and targets for justice and for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. Bill Butler touched on the target of
I do not think that that could possibly be said. It also depends on the number of cases that are reported to the procurator fiscal. Over the past few years, we have seen rises in the number of cases that are reported and a rise in the detection rate. That is good news from one point of view, but it means more work for us.
Although I recognise the validity of everything that you say and accept that we are not dealing with a static situation even if we have no interventions, in both the justice targets and the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service targets, there is a series of interventions, some of which are distinctly directed towards reducing the case load in courts and others of which, by seeking to reduce offending behaviour, should contribute to a reduction of the case load in courts. I put it to you that you must have some planning basis that incorporates the success of the initiatives, which you, as a member of the Executive, should assume. I am really trying to find out how robust your planning is.
You are right that we have made certain assumptions. For example, we have assumed a 6 per cent increase in the number of reports that are received by procurators fiscal in 2005-06, which will reduce to 5 per cent thereafter. We have also assumed a certain increase in the number of non-court disposals. We have seen a 12 per cent increase in the number of net petitions—that is, sheriff and jury cases and High Court cases—over the past few years, and we have assumed a continuing 10 per cent increase in that. We have not factored in—because it would be wrong to do so—the possibility of a 2 per cent reduction in reconviction rates. Nor have we factored in a 10 per cent reduction in the number of persistent young offenders.
The committee would like an update on your department's efforts to recover assets financed from the proceeds of crime through the criminal confiscation and civil recovery units. Have any targets been set for the level of assets that the units hope to recover in the period up to 2007-08?
We have not set those targets. I am aware that the director of the Scottish Drug Enforcement Agency has a target, but that was set by him. I can tell you that £800,000 has been recovered in the past six months under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002. Using criminal and civil powers, £2.96 million has been recovered since the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 came into effect in the beginning of 2003. In addition, assets in excess of £17 million have been frozen by the civil recovery unit and the criminal confiscation unit. The financial crime unit, which deals with the confiscation of the proceeds of crime following conviction, has recouped £422,421 from drug dealers, money launderers and people convicted of fraud over the past six months. The civil recovery unit has recovered £368,511 in the past six months. Those two figures make up the £800,000 that I mentioned.
When you say that £2.96 million has been recovered, does that mean that that money is in your back pocket, as it were, or that it is in the pipeline? I would expect that it would take a long time for the money to come through the system.
The £2.96 million is money that has been recovered. I will need to clarify my understanding of the situation, but that is the amount in relation to which orders have been made. I am not personally involved in the recovery, so I would need to find out precisely what the figures are.
So the £2.96 million has not yet been collected.
I think that it has been, but I will clarify the situation and write to the committee with a definite answer.
That would be helpful.
I am sorry but, as I was not involved in the negotiations on that, I cannot answer your question. On a previous occasion, this committee asked me questions about the recovered asset fund so I thought that I should get up-to-date information on it in anticipation of further questions being asked. That is the information that I have given you. However, I did not ask questions about the matter that you raise. Perhaps I could add that information to the letter that I send the committee.
That would be helpful. Do you know the average length of time that is taken from the start of the process to getting the money in? From discussions with members of the Irish Parliament it seemed to me that in Ireland they were getting to the end point much more quickly than we were.
It would depend on which part of the process you are talking about. For example, a large sum of money has now been frozen, but in cases of criminal confiscation there has to be a conviction before we can recover money. Part of the delay is due to the trial process and, if there is an appeal, the appeal process. Civil recovery is relatively new, but I can tell you that Scotland has had the first completed recovery process—for a sum of about £10,000 from Stonehaven—and we have had other orders. What is happening here compares favourably with what is happening in England and Wales. It is probably too early to give you a figure for the average time, because too few cases have been completed for a meaningful appraisal to be made.
You mentioned the figure for assets that have been frozen—I did not catch whether it was £14 million or £17 million. In view of what you have just said, does that figure represent the assets that have been frozen while you are waiting to prosecute and which you are likely to get in if everyone is found guilty?
The figure relates to both civil recovery powers and criminal confiscation powers. We can freeze assets. If we do not get a conviction there is always the possibility of attacking the assets through the civil recovery process rather than criminal confiscation process. The £17 million is a global figure that might come under either the criminal confiscation process or the civil recovery process.
I have a short follow-up question. My understanding is that you freeze the assets when a case is coming up and you decide whether to go down the criminal or civil route. Roughly £3 million has been recovered or is on its way to us. How much of the £17 million has been unfrozen? What percentage of it are you not pursuing? If £17 million of assets have been frozen since 2003, are we saying that in every single case those assets have been recovered or are awaiting recovery?
The £17 million is the amount that is frozen at present.
Right. I picked you up as saying that there had been £17 million of assets frozen since 2003.
It is since April, but £17 million is the amount that is frozen at present. We have been freezing assets since April and have frozen £17 million.
Would it be possible to have that in writing? You are obviously reading it off.
I undertake to write with a fuller explanation of the workings of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 and where we are with it and will cover the points that Stewart Maxwell raised about the agreement with the Treasury.
I really wanted to discover whether there were circumstances in which the asset had been frozen but it was proving difficult to—
We understand the seizure and confiscation element; we are less clear about what triggers the release of assets to the Treasury. Can you clarify that in correspondence?
I can.
Do you want to make any concluding remarks?
No, thank you.
On behalf of both committees I thank the Lord Advocate and his colleagues Mr Gordon and Mr Woodhouse for attending this afternoon.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
Good afternoon again, everyone. I reconvene this meeting of the Justice 1 Committee and the Justice 2 Committee. I welcome the Minister for Justice, Cathy Jamieson, and her advisers Ruth Ritchie and Jim Gallagher. Thank you all for coming before us. Minister, do you want to say anything by way of preliminary comment, or do you just want to get the interrogation under way?
I thought that on this occasion we should have as much time as possible for committee members to ask questions, therefore I have not prepared a statement in advance. I thought that you would want to move straight to questions.
Clearly a duplicitous attempt to ingratiate the minister with the committee.
As you will be aware, the Audit Committee examined the issue in relation to Mr Black's report, in which he highlighted some of those figures. In that report, he drew the Audit Committee's attention to the fact that the 2003-04 accounts included the provision of £26 million and the contingent liability of £136 million to reflect the potential cost to the SPS of settling court cases from former and existing prisoners who claim that the conditions in which they were held or are being held breached or are breaching their rights under the ECHR. That was based on consideration of the judgment in Mr Napier's case. As Bob Black pointed out, it was right and proper that the SPS had a contingent liability in its accounts, but that does not mean that the Executive accepts that that sum of money will be paid out—far from it. Indeed, as you will be aware, some of the aspects of that judgment are being appealed through the proper processes.
Convener, might I add a technical point? The minister rightly distinguished between the provision of £26 million in the accounts—which is backward looking and scores, as it were, as expenditure although, as the minister said, it is not necessarily cash out of the door—and the £136 million, which is the contingent liability, that is, the thing that might happen.
We accept that, but my first concern is to find out what instructed the figure of £136 million. For example, why not have a figure of £34 million or £210 million? There must have been some formulaic approach to bring forth that estimate of £136 million. The minister indicated that the SPS did some kind of calculation.
Obviously, the SPS considered the numbers that, in a worst-case scenario, could be involved and what the liabilities could be. It is important to recognise that it has been accepted that it was right and proper for the SPS to do that and to show that potential liability in its accounts. It is also important to stress that that does not mean that we accept that the money is going, or will go, out the door.
It seems to me that that situation confronts the Executive with a dilemma. Either the Executive says, "Well, we'll wait and see whether the ceiling falls in and if it does we will try to provide for it," or it says, "Well, something's bound to happen and we should make some responsible provision in future budgets." Now, which is it? Is the Executive sitting back and making no financial provision, or is it minded to accept that something ultimately may stick to the wall? Can you help the committee, minister, in understanding how the Executive is considering the matter?
It is not a case of either/or, nor is it a case of sitting back and waiting for something to happen. Committee members will have seen the additional funding that has been put in place for the SPS to address problems in the prison estate and noted the figure of £181 million, which I have quoted regularly. It is important to recognise that there has been sufficient investment in SPS funding. In the past, committee members have urged the Executive to take on board the requirement to upgrade and to end slopping out. It is our intention to do that. There are pressures and difficulties around that and it is right and proper that we have the contingent liability. However, we also have hard cash up front to deal with the problems.
Again, just to clarify: I presume that the hard cash is partially to try to achieve an end to slopping out, which is a capital commitment.
That is clearly shown. We are putting in additional funding to ensure that we can ultimately achieve our goal of ending slopping out. The committee will be aware that it is difficult to give precise timescales for that, but we have indicated that we want to end slopping out about a year after the opening of the second new prison because, of course, we require to increase the number of places within our current prison estate. However, the two new prisons and the continuing upgrading of the existing prison estate are critical to achieving the goal of ending slopping out.
Okay, so is there even an approximate timespan for that?
Some of the difficulty is that we require things such as planning permission for the new-build prisons. As soon as we have achieved that, we will be able to get the work up and running. I do not want to give a timescale that would allow people to hold the Executive to something that is not deliverable. I am sure that the committee would not wish us to state a timescale just for the sake of doing so. I would be popular if I gave a timescale, but that might not be the right thing to do. That is why I prefer to say that, if we can get the movement, we can get the new places put in and can end slopping out about a year after the second new prison opens.
There is also a specifically financial question. We understand the need to earmark money to meet capital commitments, but we remain unclear about the earmarking of money to deal with potential claims. You said that hard cash was needed to deal with problems. We understand that, in relation to slopping out, a lot of hard cash will be needed. However, is hard cash also part of the Executive's thinking in trying to provide for whatever element of the contingent liability might crystallize?
We would need to think about that. However, what I have tried to do with this budget in particular, and with the spending review, is to ensure that we get cash into the physical improvements in the prison estate. There is additional cash for doing that and that has been the focus of my attention. Of course, the Executive is aware that other things may well come in further down the line, but I have always been clear that I would not allow that to stop the work that needs to be done on the physical upgrading of the prison estate.
So, there is no additional cash for the crystallization of contingent liability at this stage.
It might be helpful if I distinguish again between the £26 million and the £136 million. The £26 million is hard cash. For any claim that arises that is analogous to Mr Napier's claim, the SPS has made provision for the payment of that cash in its accounts. The £136 million represents its calculation of what might happen in a worst-case scenario. The budget does not provide cash to deal with that, as it is only something that might happen.
To what extent does the split between the budgetary provision and the notice of contingent liability differentiate between remand prisoners and convicted prisoners? I understand that there is something in there. To what extent—if any—are those numbers affected by your ability to deliver a slopping-out-free estate? Are they unaffected by your doing that and looking backwards to the situation that prevailed? The Napier case has obviously already happened.
It is worth remembering that the Napier case was associated with the so-called triple vices. The basis on which the calculations have been made has taken into account those specific circumstances. I have made it clear that I want to see progress on ending slopping out irrespective of whether it is, ultimately, going to cost the Executive money in compensation claims. It is the right thing to do to upgrade the prison estate, and it is the right thing to do to move towards ending slopping out. I am not sure that I entirely understand your question in relation to remand and convicted prisoners.
I am seeking the respective liabilities for the two categories. I am also seeking your confirmation that the ending of slopping out—which, I suspect, is a shared goal regardless of politics—does not affect those numbers, which reflect what has already happened rather than what is going to happen.
The numbers reflect the calculations that were done on the basis of the Napier scenario. I could not tell you off the top of my head how many remand prisoners and convicted prisoners they refer to.
I think that I understand Stewart Stevenson's point. The triple vices to which the minister referred, which affected Mr Napier, included the fact that the regime meant that he spent a long time in his cell. He was, at that point, a remand prisoner. The regime that affected remand prisoners in Barlinnie at that time was certainly not particularly satisfactory. Therefore, in the £26 million that has been crystallized to reflect the liability going backwards for people who are in the same situation as Mr Napier and who are likely to be compensated for that, remand prisoners will be over-represented because they are over-represented in the triple vices.
While we are on the subject of slopping out, could I—
We have a lot of questions to ask, Stewart. Keep it snappy.
The minister will expect me to ask this question. The Executive's statement said that it will end slopping out a year after the establishment of two new prisons.
Yes, that is the aim.
There is also a commitment to keep Peterhead prison open, where slopping out is carried out virtually throughout the prison apart from in 10 cells. When might you be in a position to say how the issues related to the long-term sex offenders at Peterhead might be dealt with in relation to slopping out?
I am not surprised that Stewart Stevenson has asked that question, as he has pursued the matter vigorously. I had the opportunity to visit Peterhead prison, which is in his constituency, in his company during the course of the year and looked at the facilities there. It is clear to me that we face specific pressures there because of the age and nature of the building and because some of the remedies to upgrade physical conditions that have been possible at other prison sites have not been possible there. There is no getting away from the fact that we face certain challenges. In the meantime, we have tried to ensure that some of the other problems, especially around overcrowding and the pressures on the regime, do not lead to triple vices occurring at Peterhead.
If—hopefully when—you win the Napier appeal, I assume that that will not be the end of the matter. Presumably then you will not need the £136 million, so how much of the £26 million are you going to need?
I cannot pre-empt what the court might decide. There might be other cases that are not exactly the same as Mr Napier's coming through the system. It is important to restate that my commitment is that it is right and proper that we should appeal decisions, where we believe that that ought to be done. At the same time, we ought also to continue to work to improve the prison estate. That links to some of the things about which I am sure people will want to talk later, such as targets on reducing reoffending, getting people through the system, and considering alternatives to the prison system where that is the right and proper thing to do. It is difficult for me to say how much of that will be needed until we get some judgment from the court.
It might be helpful to Mike Pringle to know that the payment that was made to Mr Napier was what might be described as a common-law fault payment rather than an ECHR payment. It is the ECHR issue that raises very important questions and that is what the Executive is appealing.
Will you elaborate on the difference between the £26 million and the £136 million just so that I am clear? The £26 million is for cases that we know are in the pipeline. Is that fair?
How Jim Gallagher described the situation is as good a description as any. The £26 million is looking back to the possibility of people who were in similar situations to Mr Napier making successful claims in court. The other amount is for what would be the worst-case scenario, if you like, in the future.
Is it fair to say that the worst-case scenario would be if everyone who could pursue a claim did so and won?
It would also include claims that relate to situations other than Mr Napier's. The £136 million is intended to represent ECHR cases that might arise other than just the particular case that Mr Napier raised about slopping out and the other triple vices.
When you came to the committee last year, minister, you made clear your commitment to eradicating slopping out. Your commitment then was the same as it is today, which is that after the two new prisons have been built, plus one year, you hope to end it completely. I would be the first to accept that there has been substantial progress in the year since you said that. What progress do you anticipate making in the coming year? You are committed to ending slopping out completely but beyond that, we can make progress.
Since I last appeared at the committee, you will be aware that slopping out has ended at Barlinnie. That was a significant milestone in the process. New house blocks have opened in some of our existing prisons. I have announced that we are looking to create an additional 500 places within the prison estate and to ensure that the financial resources are there to back that up. The spending review shows that the financial resources have been put in place to back up that work. I expect that the on-going work in the prisons that are being redeveloped will be finished and that we will make progress towards the new prisons.
I want to clarify the question of the worst possible scenario although, like Mike Pringle, I hope that it does not come about. Does it mean that the benchmark date is when the ECHR entered Scots law? Is the benchmark date 1999, or is it the date of the establishment of the ECHR? I can see the different routes and I understand the particular circumstances of the Napier case and that it was more than slopping out; it was about the conditions that he suffered while he was on remand. The worst possible scenario would be that everyone who could potentially claim that slopping out breached their rights under the ECHR made a claim.
We are working on the principle that the benchmark date is 1999.
The suggestion by Napier's solicitors is that it was obvious to anyone that any agency that had audited the question of potential breaches of the ECHR would have known that slopping out is a breach of someone's human rights. While I support the views of members of this committee who believe that we should end slopping out, I do not think that it was obvious that slopping out would be a breach of the ECHR, no article of which relates to the practice.
My understanding is that all Executive departments and agencies were required to conduct such an audit.
Most of the members of the justice committees are clear that tackling crime is a key priority for the Executive, so you can understand our disappointment at the fact that the Executive has rejected our plea that tackling crime should become a formal cross-cutting priority.
When I last discussed this matter with the justice committees, people were concerned to see that the Executive was genuinely making a financial priority of the crime and antisocial behaviour agenda and was not just prioritising what someone described as the rhetoric—I am not suggesting that you were that person, Jackie.
It is enormously helpful. It will undoubtedly provide a focus for those other departments who do not have it as their top priority and should be of use in your discussions with your colleagues.
It is fair to say that I expect the reducing offending agenda to be one of the issues that is addressed across the justice portfolio. Therefore, people should not think that the amount of money that pops up in that budget line is the only money that is being spent in that regard. I felt that it was important that we identified some money that would enable us to take on some of the reforms that might be required around reducing reoffending, such as creating a more integrated service. However, the target that has been set means that all the different bits of the justice system need to work together and focus on reducing reoffending.
I will discuss the detail of that with you later.
Table 1.08 deals with other current spending in the SPS, which includes spending on prisoners' food, medical services and so on. That funding flatlines from 2003 to 2008. Does the rise in the prison population indicate that you are trying to starve prisoners into submission? Does not the flatline spending commitment suggest that you do not have much confidence in your ability to reduce the number of the prison population or does it tell us something else?
No, it tells us that we expect the Scottish Prison Service to ensure that it is efficient in its provision and that it gives us good value for money. We expect the same of all Executive departments and agencies. Although Stewart Stevenson highlighted one expenditure flatline, we also have to look at the fact that the lines for direct running costs and capital expenditure increase significantly over the same period. If we look at the foot of the table, we find that the total spend on the SPS rises from £290,189,000 in 2002-03 to £427,701,000 in 2007-08. We cannot be accused of starving the Scottish Prison Service of funds.
But do you not accept that that budget line relates directly to prisoner numbers? I trust that I have understood the accounts correctly.
Yes, but you will see that the footnote to the direct running costs, which form the top line of the table, says that the line
The justice portfolio contains a great number of priorities. Indeed, I am reliably informed that there are 57 priorities for the three-year period 2005 to 2008, of which 45 relate to the 2005-06 budget. Is it realistic for all of them to be considered as priorities?
If we look at the overall priorities in the justice portfolio, we can see clearly that we are trying to solve some of the problems around crime and antisocial behaviour. We are trying to speed up court processes in order to ensure that we deliver access to justice for those who require it. The overall justice targets have a number of targets within them that help us to ensure that we are moving in the right direction. Broadly speaking, the various targets enable us to see whether the trends are moving in the right direction.
I understand that, but given the minister's new strategic role, would it not be better to have fewer priorities so that your strategy for the various elements of the justice portfolio can be seen more clearly?
If Margaret Mitchell looks at the priority areas for the targets in this spending review, she will see a commitment to reducing re-offending; improving the rate of clearing up serious crimes; enabling the Scottish Drug Enforcement Agency to disrupt criminal networks; getting more people into drug treatment and rehabilitation; and reducing the number of persistent young offenders. I have to say that the targets for some of those areas are quite stretching. The overall priorities set the general direction in which the justice portfolio should go. I hope that the document makes clear our general direction.
I am concerned that the setting of so many priorities might lead people to think that your approach is not strategic—people might think that you are firefighting.
Margaret Mitchell will have to forgive me, but she should look at the statements of priorities that are to be found throughout the justice portfolio section of the document. We have to ensure that each part of the justice system can deliver on its priorities. They need to contribute to our overall aim of ensuring that we enhance community safety, improve our crime clear-up rates, reduce re-offending and deal with the problems of persistent youth offending. Each of those areas is important in itself and each has to have its own set of priorities.
I ask the minister to turn her attention to the 12 priorities that are set out for 2006-07 and 2007-08. Is it possible to rank them?
I am sorry, which priorities?
I am referring to the priorities for 2006-07 and 2007-08 on pages 11 and 12 of the draft budget.
I am sorry, but I did not catch what you asked.
There are 12 priorities. Is it possible to rank them?
I do not know why we would want to rank them.
Because by definition a priority is something that you would want to do first or consider to be more important.
It is fair to say that the priorities listed on pages 11 and 12, which are repeated under the sub-headings in each of the budget lines, are the things within those lines to which the minister has given priority.
Do all 12 have equal priority?
We have to reflect the fact that we have a partnership agreement and have said that we would deliver on a number of commitments. If the committee took the view that providing the Scottish Prison Service with additional money was not a priority or that allocating the additional money for legal aid, for the police service, for the sheriff courts or for the pay, pension and modernisation costs in the fire service was not a priority, I would be grateful to hear about it. Those are the priorities that the committees and the Executive identified and it was my responsibility to try to deliver the resources.
I want to press you further. The last priority on the list is to roll forward investment in youth crime prevention. Are we to assume that that is the bottom of the list of priorities?
Absolutely not. I made that clear. I take the issue of dealing with persistent young offenders very seriously indeed. That is why we introduced the youth crime prevention fund and the intensive support fund in the first place. In this spending review round we have ensured that that continues beyond the timescale for which it was originally allocated.
I have one final question on the two new prisons to deal with the overcrowding that you mentioned. If early release is ended, will that have a significant impact on the prison population and will that be taken into account?
There are a number of areas in which it would not be appropriate for me to comment on the work of the Sentencing Commission. There has certainly been a lot of speculation and I have concerns about the current arrangements, which I certainly want to discuss with the Sentencing Commission. We have to acknowledge that we require a joined-up, integrated approach. That is why we have tried in this spending review round to ensure not only that there is money to upgrade the prison estate and to put in place the community penalties that are right and proper in some instances, but that the funding allows for the transition between prison and the community.
We have been pressing for an end to early release for a considerable amount of time. How do you see it impacting on the system?
You have to acknowledge that there is a difference between automatic early release for prisoners serving up to four years and the parole arrangements, which it would be premature to discuss without seeing the work that I have asked the Sentencing Commission to do before it presents recommendations to me.
I await that with interest.
I call Colin Fox. We have quite a lot to get through, so members should keep questions fairly brief.
I will be as succinct as ever. The committees' report on stage 1 of the budget process recommended that any efficiency savings achieved as a result of the reforms in the criminal justice system should be retained within the system. Will you assure us that that will happen?
I have already mentioned what we have done in relation to prisons. The savings are a question not of taking money out of the prison budget but of ensuring that people concentrate on being efficient so that some of the money that can be generated from efficiencies is used elsewhere in the system.
I am mindful of last week's question in the chamber when there was a difference of opinion about what is an efficiency and what is a cut. Can you give us an idea of how much you expect or hope to achieve in annual savings in the department in the years to 2007-08?
I made it clear last week that I see a cut as being when money is taken away and something else is done with it. What we are asking people to do is to ensure that they are efficient, to aim for some targets and to produce savings that are regenerated and used again in the system. That is entirely different.
Do you have an idea of how much you expect those savings to be?
I presume that you are talking specifically about savings in the Scottish Prison Service. It is well documented that the Scottish Prison Service has been asked to achieve a 5 per cent target, and governors and others are heavily involved in that.
It is fair to say that there are programmes that are intended to produce greater efficiency across the justice services, and that the committee would expect the offices involved to be working on that. As the minister says, there is a specific programme in the Scottish Prison Service. It is not about cutting the totals, which are increasing; it is about identifying where resources can be redeployed within the service to meet the objectives that the minister sets. The same is true for the Scottish Court Service, the police service and the other services covered by the justice portfolio. That is all part of the Executive's overall approach to efficient government, which I think you would expect us to pursue.
I take your point and I understand the 5 per cent figure that has been given for the Scottish Prison Service, but I was referring to the department as a whole. Can you give us any idea about that?
There is not an across-the-board percentage, because the circumstances vary from programme to programme, but ministers intend to produce their overall plan for efficient government quite soon. The justice contribution will be displayed in that, and we are still working on the numbers.
The minister has already referred to persistent offending, prompted by Jackie Baillie. We all have a great interest in that and all welcome the fact that a target has been set for reducing the number of persistent offenders by 10 per cent by March 2008. I do not know whether the minister wants to comment on the fact that the target relates to young offenders. She said that there has been some difficulty in bringing about a baseline measurement from which one can go on to measure the achievement of the target. Will she say a bit more about that? Perhaps she could also give us an indication of how she defines what a persistent offender might be.
There are two separate issues there. First of all, we have specific targets relating to the youth justice system and persistent young offenders. I hope that the convener will allow me to note that I do not wish to pre-empt information that I shall be making available to Parliament in a statement later this week about some of the baseline figures. Some of the figures that we need to firm up for those targets are provided to us by the Scottish Children's Reporter Administration and others. Again, it is important to recognise that we have had a 10 per cent target for reducing the number of persistent young offenders in the system, but I want to roll that target forward for another couple of years from 2005-06 up until 2007-08. We now have a clearer definition, and I shall say more about that in my statement to Parliament on Thursday.
You said that the figures that we have in front of us show the spend from 2006 to 2007, but you have indicated that there is spend on that in the meantime. How will that be carried out and how will we see it coming through in the work that you are doing? Also, can you tell us what guidance has been issued to agencies on addressing persistent offending?
Again, I shall focus on targets relating to young offenders, because there are other issues relating to adults who go through the revolving-door process. The youth crime action plan introduced and provided additional resources for the fast-track children's hearings. It also ensured that, in each local authority area, there is a multi-agency youth justice team that is tasked with identifying the persistent young offenders in the area and ensuring that programmes are in place to deal with those young people. We have also introduced the pilot youth court in Hamilton. The results so far are encouraging, but I want to see how it works and to perform a proper evaluation before we decide whether we will take it further.
Will you be able to keep the committee up to date and give us further reports on how those are rolling out?
I do not wish to pre-empt what I will say later in the week when I give Parliament an update on some of work that has been done on the youth crime action plan, but it is my intention to keep people up to date on the issues.
I refer to table 1.03, on criminal injuries compensation. Given that the minister has plans to reduce offending, why in the period 2002-08 does the criminal injuries compensation budget flatline throughout, and why are we paying 11 per cent of the England, Wales and Scotland budget?
There are a couple of points. First, we have a service-level agreement with the Home Office. The Executive pays a percentage of the total United Kingdom cost of compensation payments made under the criminal injuries compensation scheme and the admin costs of the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority and the appeals panel. The percentage is based on a rolling average of Scottish claims under the scheme over the previous three years. Therefore, the exact percentage figure is not known until the start of the payment year in question.
Given that a comparison of the English and Scottish statistics that my researchers have done suggests—and I use that word advisedly—that we have only 6.4 per cent of the total number of cases, do the figures indicate that compensation is more generous in Scotland, which is not something with which I would necessarily be uncomfortable?
I am not sure that we can draw that conclusion. We would require to examine further information, which we would be happy to do.
Stewart Stevenson will realise that, so far as the present compensation scheme is concerned, the level of compensation is fixed in regulations. The scheme is tariff based, and the tariffs are the same north and south of the border. In the scheme, there are some old cases that are under the previous non-tariff scheme, but it is unlikely that they have the effect that Stewart Stevenson suggests. I do not recognise the 6.4 per cent figure that his researchers have dug out.
We would be happy to examine Stewart Stevenson's figures, but I do not immediately recognise them.
Last year, we discussed the police retirement bulge that is coming up in the next few years, which has been created by the significant recruitment of police officers in the 1970s and early 1980s. It appears from the spending plans for the period up to 2007-08 that there is provision for the additional recruitment of police officers to offset that bulge. In its evidence to us earlier this year, the police service told the committees that it wants to recruit an additional 100 officers in 2006-07, and a further 200 the following year. Will the spending plans meet those bids? If they will not, can you explain why?
The important point is that we have increased the budgets, as you have acknowledged, and are moving towards a position where the grant-aided expenditure, for example, will top £1 billion.
I accept your arithmetic.
It is not a case of forces having their budgets cut. All forces will get a percentage increase, although some will get a larger percentage increase to take account of the new formula. That will be done over a period of time and we have made additional resources available to do that. That was one of the things that came out in the GAE review, which took a considerable amount of time to come to that conclusion because people were concerned to ensure that individual forces would not lose out and that numbers of officers would not drop. We have gone to great lengths to ensure that that does not happen.
In the first answer you gave me, you said that the figure could potentially be 400-plus officers. Will you explain what you mean by "potentially"? That suggests that potentially it might not be that figure.
It could be more.
It could be fewer.
It could be more. I am saying that the funding is available to achieve that and that there could be more funding because of the way in which the pension system works and the point at which costs are paid.
Are you telling me that there is flexibility for individual police authorities to use the money elsewhere and that there might be variation in the number of officers?
It is important to recognise that it is for chief constables to decide on their area's operational policing requirements for the amount of funding that is provided. Everyone is clear that we have a record number of police officers throughout Scotland and we expect that those numbers will be maintained. We have put in place a budget that allows us to do that and to deal with the problems of the retirement bulge and recruitment. The committee was clear that we should address that issue and we have done so.
I accept that there have been some moves towards that. The initial figures of 45 and 135 officers are not in dispute. Given the demands on the police service, the money that you are giving it could and might rightly be used for other priorities within individual police authorities. Therefore, could not it be the case that the money would be used for those other priorities and that we would end up with the 45 and 135 officers that you talked about earlier rather than the 400-plus officers that you indicated? That would fall some way short of the 100 and 200 new officers that the police service said it required.
I am not sure whether you are suggesting that, as the minister, I should be directing the chief constables on their operations.
I am not suggesting that at all. I am suggesting that the difference between 45 and 135 and the 400 that you have indicated is substantial.
I am saying that the resources have been put in place to enable the maintenance of the numbers at their present levels and to deal with the potential problems around recruitment and retirement. Of course, it is for chief constables to decide on operational policing requirements.
I accept that and will move off that point. Let us talk about pensions instead. Obviously recruitment will have a knock-on effect and will create a retirement bulge in the years 2009-10 and beyond. Will you confirm that the money is in place to deal with what has been called a pensions time bomb? If it is not in place at the moment, will it definitely be in place for the next spending review?
I cannot pre-empt any future spending review, but in this spending review round we have put in place the right measures to deal with the problem.
Are you saying that within the current spend, money for the pensions is in place?
Yes, it is.
I want to talk about Reliance and the escort service, which is being rolled out across Scotland and has budgetary implications. Will you give us details on that and on how it will impact on the police budget?
As an example, in Strathclyde, more than 100 police officers who were previously involved in escort duties have been freed up to take on other responsibilities. Are you asking whether the roll-out will free up officers?
I was wondering what effect it will have on the police budget.
None at all, because additional resources were given to the police to maintain officer numbers. Resources were put in place to deal with the prison escort service. Now, officers are being freed up as a result of the service being rolled out. It has not rolled out across Scotland completely, and it will not do so unless and until the appropriate assurances have been put in place.
So it was new money that went to Reliance; it did not come from the police or the SPS.
Additional money was provided in the last spending review. Jim Gallagher will correct me if I am wrong.
It was after the last spending review.
It was provided to ensure that the police did not have to reduce their budgets. Extra money was put in.
The last time you were at the committee to talk about the Reliance roll-out we discussed the use of video links for formal appearances at court, instead of prisoners having to go to court. Has anything more been done about that? For example, has a cost-benefit analysis been carried out? I know that there was a pilot. Do you have any thoughts on rolling it out? What are the cost benefits?
In response to previous work, I indicated that we would roll it out further and that has been taken forward. I want to keep matters in a number of areas under close review including the frequent occurrence of people having to appear in more than one court in the same town or city on the same day and the costs involved in transporting them to and from courts that might only be a few hundred yards apart. That is not necessarily the best way forward in the longer term.
So you will keep us informed about the process.
Absolutely.
My question is about the police, but it is on a slightly different note. I notice that you have accepted the recommendations of the working group on revised arrangements for distributing police grant-aided expenditure. When Willie Rae came before us last year, he hinted that new arrangements were about to emerge. What will be the impact of the new distribution formula, and what advantages will it bring?
The new distribution formula will, for the first time, recognise the different pressures on different forces. Rather than just being population based, it will take account of issues such as pressures from city-centre policing, rural dimensions and crime rates, and will better reflect the situation. Some areas felt that the previous formula did not take account of those points. As I said to members earlier, it was important to me that it was not a case of having winners and losers and a redistribution. We have ensured that additional resources will go in to deliver the formula in future, and that distribution will be levelled up over a period of time. The police were keen for us to do that, and we took account of that.
I appreciate your earlier point that there is going to be plenty money in the budget, so I do not think that any force will notice the difference in this spending review. However, will there eventually be winners and losers, or are you going to keep putting money in? Surely the point of changing the formula is that, at some point, it will affect different forces in different ways.
The alternative for us would have been to take money from somewhere just now and put it somewhere else. Instead of that, we have said that every force will continue to get above-inflation rises, year on year, and that forces that, it is felt, require to get additional money under the new formula will get money over and above that. It is not a case of a force finding that its budget is staying flat until all the others catch up: every force will get an increase, with some getting bigger increases than others in order to level it out over a period of time.
What is that period of time?
It takes us up to 2009.
The spending review period that is displayed in the draft budget documentation takes us up to 2007-08, and the completion of the GAE redistribution, which was set up in the working group that has been referred to, will be in 2008-09.
That is quite a long time into the future, but I presume that you will tell us at some point what will happen in 2008-09. I think that you realise my concern. It seems to be good news at the moment, but I am concerned that you might say in 2008-09 that you will no longer put in the additional resources and that the formula will operate differently. If that happened, there might be winners and losers after 2009.
Obviously, it would not be right for the minister to pre-empt the spending review after this one, which will impact on that year. However, provided that the current baselines remain unchanged—unattacked—by the next spending review, it should be possible to complete the redistribution in that period without creating losers.
We are focusing on the justice issue, but it is important that all MSPs understand the implications of the change. If we agree to the change in the formula—[Laughter.] Okay; we do not really have any choice, because that decision has been made. If, in 2009, the Executive—whoever that might be—were to say that it was going to implement the formula that was agreed in 2004 but that it was not going to put in any extra money, there might be issues for the politicians who had accepted that formula, depending on the effect on their local area.
As I said, the minister cannot pre-empt what the Executive—whoever that might be, as you said—might do in the next spending review. However, it is clear from the way in which the numbers work out that, if we stick with the baselines that we have in the current spending review, it will be possible to reallocate the resources in such a way that there will still be no losers.
That is very welcome news, especially if the formula is going to take account of city centres. I represent a rather large city centre, so I welcome that reassurance.
I am well aware of the representations that you have been making.
Did the Executive consider allocating an additional amount to the police grant-aided expenditure for 2005-06 to enable the new formula to be implemented immediately rather than from 2009-10?
It would be nice if we had that much money. The new formula is being phased in over a number of years.
It is being phased in to ensure that progress is sustainable. That is important.
The minister will be aware that the committee recommended in its stage 1 report that the Scottish Court Service's capital programme should be a priority in the spending review, to ensure that all courts—not just Parliament House—are fit for purpose. For instance, there should be wheelchair access and separate waiting rooms for prosecution and defence witnesses. It will come as no surprise to you that we are a bit concerned that the budget is at a lower flatline level of £10.334 million in each of the next three years, compared with nearly £15 million in the current year. Would you care to comment on the committee's concern on that point? Also, what are the objectives of the programme for the next three years?
Members will recall that, when we discussed those issues, a number of members reminded me—if I needed reminding—of the particular difficulties in certain court areas. Several people around the table are looking at me now. The Scottish Court Service is close to completing a strategic review of the estate. It has an on-going programme to address issues around the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, such as security and, of course, health and safety obligations.
Can you give a best estimate of when all courts will have at least minimal disabled access? You just said that the majority have some form of disabled access.
There are particular problems around the listed buildings. Once the strategy has been put together, I will be more than happy to provide the committee with further information on disabled access. However, it is a difficult issue and a challenge. We will have to consider the issue at length to ensure that we can improve the condition of our court buildings.
I accept that, but can you tell us when the strategy will be ready so that we will know when you can give us information on disabled access?
Jim Gallagher may have a final date for that, but I certainly expect the strategy to come to us in the not-too-distant future.
I would hope that that would be before the end of the financial year, but perhaps not before the end of the calendar year.
I am obliged. Thank you.
I do not know that I can ask anything that Bill Butler has not already asked. However, the minister is aware of my concerns about the Highland courts, especially in relation to access for disabled people in one or two of the courts. As the minister rightly said, the buildings are very old and I would have thought that they will be impossible to convert. The minister will also be aware that the High Court sits in Inverness in buildings that, I think, are unsuitable. I look forward to the publication of the strategy, but I wonder whether it will cover only the refurbishment of existing buildings. Are there plans for new builds?
In some instances, it may make more sense to consider new builds, but we would have to take account of restrictions on budgets. I know that Maureen Macmillan has a particular interest in the Inverness situation. Discussions have taken place with Highland Council, which would like to redevelop particular buildings in Inverness. However, it would be wrong of me to suggest that we have a solution to that problem just now.
Okay, thanks.
Turning to the fire service, I wonder whether you are satisfied—I think that I probably know the answer to this—that sufficient provision has been made in the central Government fire provision and the fire GAE to ensure that the fire service can be restructured without any diminution of service or standards.
I will remind you of the figures. We are increasing the GAE allocation for the fire service for 2005-06 from the previously announced figure of £261.8 million to £276 million; additionally, that will rise to £282 million, then to £291 million. That means that by 2007-08 the GAE will have increased by 11.35 per cent over the previously announced figure for 2005-06. We have also allocated an additional £16.8 million in 2004-05 to assist fire authorities with up-front costs for modernising the service. Therefore, additional resources have been put in.
I accept that additional resources have been put in, but I wondered whether certain outcomes from the Fire (Scotland) Bill and from other restructuring changes that the Executive intends to introduce are built into the figures. Are the figures reliant on there being a smaller number of control rooms, for example, and on other efficiency savings being made, or are they robust enough to deal with the outcomes, no matter what comes out of the Fire (Scotland) Bill?
A proportion of the additional fire GAE allocation will support the additional pay and pension costs for whole-time staff and pay parity for retained staff arising from the implementation of the June 2003 agreement. The additional funding will also be used to assist the Highlands and Islands fire board with the upgrading of local station facilities and the reclassification of staff from volunteer to retained status. It also includes an across-the-board increase in GAE for general distribution to the eight fire authorities. I am confident that we are doing the right thing.
My question was whether the money is in any way bounded by the outcomes that you expect from the Fire (Scotland) Bill. Specifically, do you expect to see savings in certain areas, particularly—most obviously and possibly most contentiously—through a reduction in the number of control rooms?
We have not yet reached a decision on the number of control rooms. As you are aware, recommendations have been made, and we are considering the responses to those recommendations. However, taxpayers and the public would expect us to operate whatever we are operating efficiently and effectively. Public safety is, of course, one of the paramount considerations in any decision that we take. The committee has raised the matter previously, and I gave a commitment that I would do my utmost to ensure that we make available additional resources to assist the modernisation process. That commitment has been delivered.
I hear what you are saying. However, given that you have come up with figures, you must have taken a stab at what would be the likely outcome of the Fire (Scotland) Bill and the other changes in the fire service. "Modernisation" is the word of the moment. Given that you have based the figures on expectations, what are those expectations?
I return to the matter of efficiency. We have consistently made it clear that any pay rise above inflation, for example, such as the 16 per cent rise that was awarded to fire service staff, would be self-financing over a period of time. The agreement makes it clear that savings would be generated by modernisation of the service. We have ensured that there is up-front money to enable the fire service to modernise like any other service would, and I have said that we would assist the process.
One thing has occurred to me. As well as ensuring that the court estate is DDA compliant, has there been an assessment of the prison estate to ensure that it is DDA compliant for visitors? If there has not been a move to full compliance, has any contingency funding been put in place for a possible challenge under either the DDA or the ECHR?
All the justice estate—indeed, all the public sector estate—must address itself to DDA compliance. That is true in relation to prisons as well as to courts. However, to my knowledge, none of the justice agencies has made any provision for any contingent liability in relation to failure to meet the DDA.
Could there be a challenge?
It is always conceivable that property that people think is DDA compliant will turn out not to be. At that point, there might be the possibility that liabilities will arise, but I am not aware of any at the moment.
I thank the minister and her advisers very much for joining us. We now move into private session. I ask for the committee room to be cleared of members of the public.
Meeting continued in private until 16:56.
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