Justice and Home Affairs Committee, 04 Apr 2000

Meeting date: Tuesday, April 4, 2000

Official Report 206KB pdf

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Domestic Violence

Item 4 on the agenda is the issue of domestic violence. Maureen Macmillan finally secured a meeting with the minister, at the crack of dawn one morning last week. She will report briefly on the outcome of that meeting, after which we will have a brief discussion on the committee's proposed actions.

The meeting was at the crack of dawn, at 8.30 am on 30 March—the day after I returned from an extremely arduous visit to Brussels.

Excuse us if we are not entirely sympathetic.

I did not expect any sympathy. The meeting was quite brief, and I did not have to argue my case particularly strongly as, right from the outset, the ministers said that they were supportive of the principle of the proposed bill. They cannot, however, commit themselves entirely until they see the detailed draft. I met Jackie Baillie and Jim Wallace, who said that they wanted to be inclusive of as many categories as possible. The committee had discussed the need to ensure that as many cases of abuse as possible would be covered by the bill.

In May, the Executive will publish a white paper on the proposed reforms to family law. The ministers are still quite keen to proceed with their reform of the Matrimonial Homes (Family Protection) (Scotland) Act 1981 at some stage, but that would be connected with occupancy rights and property, which our proposed bill would not address. They saw no problem with our bill fitting in with the legislation that they would introduce. In addition to the white paper in May, the report of the Scottish Partnership on Domestic Violence is due in June.

There was no suggestion that the Executive would take over our bill—it would still be our bill, and the Executive would be happy for it to proceed as a committee bill. The ministers agreed that money would be available for drafting the bill; I presume that time would also be available for its scrutiny in Parliament.

Did you get that on tape?

No.

Do you have witnesses?

There were no witnesses either. They were very cunning in having me there all by myself. I hope that that is not on the record.

Did you receive any clarification of what the minister was referring to when he talked about domestic interdicts at the time of his statement in the chamber on family law? Some of us were puzzled by that.

No, he did not clarify that, although he obviously appreciates the difference between existing interdicts with powers of arrest—which are attached to an occupancy right—and what the committee proposes, which would be accessed if there was violence, abuse or harassment. The ministers want the bill to be as inclusive as possible, and definitely do not want it to deal solely with domestic violence; it could also deal with violence between people who are not living together.

Pauline, do you want to speak or are you just waving your pen around?

Both. What Maureen has told us is great news, and she has done a good job. It is relevant in the context of our previous discussion about the committee's not having enough time to pursue what it wants to pursue. For all sorts of reasons, it would be good to start drafting the bill as soon as possible; apart from anything else, it would do the Parliament a power of good to consider a piece of legislation—perhaps the first—that has been initiated by a committee. What timetabling options are available to us?

If the committee agrees—and I get the impression that we do—that we should proceed with a committee bill, we must make a report to Parliament, setting out the need for the bill and its contents. We probably have enough discussions on the issue on the record to draft a report. I will not set a timetable for the clerks, as I know how busy they are, but we should try to get a draft report for the committee's consideration. We can then examine and finalise it.

If a draft bill is available when the report is sent to Parliament, we can attach it to the report. I am advised that that is not strictly necessary, but we might find it useful to do that nevertheless. That would mean ensuring that a draft bill was available, and I am not sure how we would get around that. Andrew Mylne will be able to advise us. We will consider the time that would probably be needed to produce a draft bill, and we will fit the draft report in around that. If we send a report to Parliament, it would be better to attach a draft bill. That may mean that we will have to wait a while before submitting the report to Parliament, but it would make the process more concise if we attached a draft bill.

Committee bills are covered by a standing order that states that the bureau must appoint a time scale for consideration of the proposal by Parliament. In effect, the timetabling of the bill as part of the committee's business is no longer a matter for our agenda; the item moves on to the parliamentary agenda. At this stage, the only concern is the time that it will take the clerks to carry out the background work.

If everybody is agreed on that course of action, we will proceed on that basis. Is everybody happy with that?

Members indicated agreement.

The proposed bill would be an extremely useful one for Parliament to debate, and I look forward to finalising the report.

I thank Maureen Macmillan for her excellent work.