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Our next item of business is focused on the justice system response to domestic abuse. This session will explore how domestic abuse cases are investigated and prosecuted, including in relation to issues such as evidence gathering, victim protection, case management and the delivery of trauma-informed approaches in the justice system.
I welcome to the committee Adam Brown, detective superintendent, specialist crime division, Police Scotland; Tim Mairs, assistant chief constable, Police Scotland; Dr Emma Forbes, national lead for domestic abuse, Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service; and Fraser Gibson, procurator fiscal for Glasgow and Strathkelvin, Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. Thank you for coming to the committee today to give evidence. I know that some of you were here earlier to hear some of the evidence from those who work with victims/survivors directly.
I will start with a question for the police, which picks up on a point that came up in discussion in the previous evidence session, and which I spoke about it in the Parliament last week. As a result of the repeal of section 23D of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995, due to the changes made by the Bail and Release from Custody (Scotland) Act 2023, officers in the junior ranks of the police have put it to me anecdotally that individuals who would have been remanded before, as repeat offenders for domestic abuse, are back in the community causing problems. This committee is well aware of the issues that relate to remand, but could Police Scotland colleagues comment specifically on the repeal of section 23D of the 1995 act and what that means on the ground?
Thank you for the opportunity to discuss this critical issue. Ms McMullen, in the previous evidence session, summed up the position really well. The change from the presumption to remand for solemn cases involving violence and sexual offences has created a position in which we really have to be on point as partners when the person is before the courts and the sheriffs have to make a decision. The situation can be a very dynamic, and the incident could have taken place not too long beforehand, which makes information and knowledge sharing really challenging. A lot of work needs to be done in that space.
In principle, the new approach is a more proportionate approach to bail. It could be argued that previously suspects who could readily be managed in the community were being remanded when they did not need to be. In simple terms, I endorse Ms McMullen’s point, which is that there is a need for really effective risk assessment across the system. Where a suspect or a perpetrator intends to harm somebody, the only complete way to prevent that from occurring is to look at a remand position. We have talked about a lot of measures, and I imagine that we will go on to talk about how we can manage risk within the community. However, we need to be clear that none of the measures are completely fail-safe. They can all be circumvented and navigated by someone who intends to cause harm, which transfers a lot of demand to police.
The change came into effect last year, so it is still quite early for us to fully understand the data around it. However, what we can say—Adam Brown will cover a little bit of this—is that we have seen an increase in breach-of-bail offences. At the moment, we are unable to completely correlate that with the changes, but Adam Brown will fill in any of the blanks.
There is a simple logic: if there are more potentially dangerous people in the community, it becomes harder to manage and assess risk and more challenging to manage things around that. We have seen an increase in domestic abuse-related breaches of bail of around 7.7 per cent over the past full year of reporting, but that figure does not include, for example, housebreakers who are on bail. It is impossible for us to ascertain whether that increase directly connects with the 23D repeal, and we do not have data on how many additional people have been released compared with before, because that sits with the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service.
The change does present challenges. We have in place a robust process for bail management, so every victim whose perpetrator is released on bail will be visited within 24 hours by a police officer who will ensure that they are aware of the conditions, do some additional safety planning, understand whether the perpetrator has already breached their bail or been in contact, or whether there have been any further problems, and just double-check at the address that the perpetrator is not already back there.
Beyond that, every perpetrator who is released on bail has a risk assessment done by one of our tier 2 teams. Those are our specialist domestic abuse officers, who are based in the geographical divisions. They assess perpetrators for risk, grading them as standard, medium or high. Based on the risk assessment, suitable interventions are determined through agreement with our local area commanders, particularly in high-risk cases. That is done case by case.
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That is the structure for bail. The tiered structure that Fiona McMullen mentioned earlier gives us the opportunity to manage that, but it goes without saying that the more potentially dangerous people there are in the community, the more challenging it is to manage them.
I want to rewind to when you said that, within 24 hours, a police officer will visit a victim to let them know the situation about a perpetrator being in the community. Are you confident that that happens all the time?
Yes. That is a compliance thing for us. We receive notification from the court, that goes through our control room and an incident is put on for officers to attend. The incident is not closed until they have attended and completed it. That is not to say that it is a completely infallible system, but that is the process, and it has been embedded in Police Scotland since we were formed.
Are you well enough resourced to be able to do that within 24 hours?
There has been quite a lot of discussion at the committee today on resourcing. It goes on as a police incident, which will not be closed until it is done, and it is to be done within 24 hours.
That is very helpful—thank you.
I turn to colleagues at the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. Having seen the first evidence session, you will be aware of my interest in the 2024 HM Inspectorate of Prosecution in Scotland report that looked at communication with victims/survivors. I was interested to see that the inspectorate has decided to go back and look again to see whether you are compliant with a couple of its recommendations. We were told earlier that you were given a score of 7 out of 10. Why are you not at 10?
Good morning, convener. Thank you for having us.
To be honest, we are delighted that the inspectorate will come back to look at communication. We have a new chief inspector now, but the original inspection into how we prosecute domestic abuse at summary level was conducted by the former chief inspector. When the report was published and I first discussed it with her, I said that I hoped that the inspectorate would come back and re-inspect on that issue, because it was an inspection of such significance that we did not want it to be lost or to go off the radar. It has piqued your attention enough to ask about it, so we are very grateful for that.
We still have work to do in relation to communication, and we need to be at 10 out of 10. Perhaps I will talk through what we have done to improve communication since the first report, and I will then talk about where I think the gaps are.
The first thing that we did was to appreciate that, if you are a busy prosecutor or a harried victim information and advice officer, it is difficult to pick up the phone. We have not had the specialist training on providing support and advocacy that our colleagues whom you heard from earlier have had. Prosecutors are there to act in the public interest and to decide whether there is sufficiency in the case. They are focused on that, the evidence and presenting it to the best of their ability to the court. However, they have a duty to victims and witnesses, and our victims have the legal right to be kept informed throughout the case—and they should be kept informed throughout.
Keeping victims informed is easier to do in some cases than in others. Domestic abuse and sexual offending are the most intimate forms of offending. It is not offending that was a one-off incident in the pub or that was witnessed on the street or in a shop. It is women’s lived experience. It is what they live with all day, every day.
There are structural barriers in the justice process to this, so we have to look at the Crown’s communication with a better understanding of the fact that we are dealing with people who have experienced profound trauma and that speaking to us is traumatic. It does not matter how hard we try or how much better we become, it will still always potentially be retraumatising to come to a prosecution office or set foot in a court. I have spoken to women who are sick on the steps of the court just because they have to go into the building.
I get all that, but recommendation 19 talks about “receiving basic information”, details on the “progression of cases” and victims being told about “charges and accepted pleas”. Those do not seem to be particularly complex things. I take your point about it being a complex situation, but that is not complex information to communicate. It is not being done, and I want to know why.
It is being done in a great many cases, but it is not always consistently done in every case. Earlier, Nicola Love made a very good point about the fact that a system that is underresourced overall will lead to inconsistency.
Before going on to say what we have done and how we are trying to be better, I just wanted you to have in the back of your mind the fact that, if victims have not received the essential support that they need before they receive a call from victim information and advice, they will cling on to that and they will need support at the point when they speak to VIA. We have VIA officers who are on the phone for hours to victims of horrific abuse. They are skilled, trained and able to do that, but that limits the number of calls that they can make in a day. If they only had to give the update and specific information, and if the whole process worked, it would be easier for us to deliver our part. That was the point that I wanted to make.
The underresourcing of our advocacy and support services has a direct impact on our ability to do our job properly. We told the inspectorate that. That is not to say that we just give out information in a robotic manner—I do not want us to do that, either. It is important that prosecutors are trauma informed and empathic, that they listen and that they respond to the emotional responses of our victims and witnesses and what they are dealing with. We have achieved that through a programme of training.
All our guidance has been revised. There was a lot of guidance for prosecutors in relation to domestic abuse, but it is now all in one place in one manual. Every time that it asks a prosecutor, VIA officer or another member of COPFS staff to do something, it explains to them why. It tells the story of a victim’s journey through the process at the same time as asking them to do their job. There are now victims’ voices embedded in all the training and guidance for our prosecutors. We have worked closely with our third sector colleagues and with individual victims brave enough to engage with us, so that victims’ voices are embedded in our trauma-informed training, our victims and witnesses training and our accredited domestic abuse training. Fiona McMullen comes and gives expert input, as do representatives of Scottish Women’s Aid and Rape Crisis Scotland. We are trying to upskill all our staff and ensure that they are better equipped.
Summary case management, which Fraser Gibson, as the operational prosecutor for Glasgow, is probably better equipped to talk about than me, has now been rolled out across the country. It is no longer a pilot. At the time that the original inspection took place, SCM was a pilot in its very early stages, but it is now business as usual across the country. As part of SCM, not only do we disclose our evidence early to the defence but there is more careful judicial management of cases.
Crucially, in every domestic abuse case, the prosecutor calls the victim at an early stage in the case, which we do for a number of reasons. The most important reason is that VIA should not be a firewall for all prosecution communications. We need our prosecutors to speak directly to victims, as well. Victims want to hear from the prosecutor—that was the feedback that we have received, and we have responded.
Another reason is that we recognise that, in the shock and awe of reporting to the police, we get only a partial story and partial disclosure. When the prosecutor takes the time to make that call, we often get further disclosures. In indictment cases, our advocates go out and meet victims ahead of the trial; in other cases, when someone comes to court, we go out to meet them. We are making significant improvements.
I hope that that will be reflected when the inspectorate returns. I have broader concerns about how we are supporting victims—not just victims of domestic abuse. In my constituency casework in the past week, I have seen real examples, which Mr Gibson is aware of, of the lack of support given to victims, which I am quite furious about.
I will hand over to Ms Bland.
Good morning, and thank you for coming.
My first question is for the police. Detective Superintendent Brown, you were asked a question about resourcing and whether you had enough resources to follow up on breach of bail, and you basically said that the incident stays open until it is complete. That does not answer the question. Do you have enough resources?
If you do not mind, I will take that question. This is an opportunity to join up this week’s discussion with the one that the committee had last week on mental health demand.
Until recently, before I took on my present role, I was an assistant chief constable in local policing. I take the committee back to last year’s budget evidence sessions that were held by its predecessor. When the chief constable gave evidence on our budget proposal for last year, she made it clear that policing was at a crossroads, as we had delivered massive efficiencies through transformation, but the complexity and volume of demands that were being placed on policing meant that we were under significant strain. The bid that we made to the Scottish Government last year would have meant not only that we would have had protection against inflation rises, but that we would have been able to increase our head count above 16,500. We were grateful for the protection that we received in the budget, but, unfortunately, we did not secure all the additional resourcing that we had asked for.
We talk about the demands on policing in areas such as domestic abuse. Many of my colleagues will talk to the committee about the demands in different areas. Members will be able to tell from my lack of hair that I am no longer a young response constable, but I have been there. Those response officers are the ones who provide a 24/7 service in our communities. When everyone else is asleep in bed at night, they are the ones who are left to deal with a bewildering range of demands, from fatal road traffic collisions to concerns about neighbourhood antisocial behaviour. That role is performed against a backdrop of high absence and a high level of duty modifications and in the context of violence against women and girls and domestic abuse.
Demand is continually rising, so the experience of our colleagues in the response teams is that they are working exceptionally hard. At times, we do not have the numbers that we would have expected to have under our previous planning, which puts strain on those officers and makes it a tiring environment to work in. It also means that, at times—Ms McMullen mentioned this—we are not able to spend the time that we would want to spend with victims to deliver the level of service that is expected.
There are a number of parts to the issue. To avoid giving a simple answer on whether we have enough resources, there is more that we can do as an organisation at a senior level to support those officers. The first area that we need to look at is how we support folks with their wellbeing to reduce absence and how we manage duty modifications so that we can support the thousands of officers who are currently unable to complete the full range of duties to get back to those duties.
The second area relates to our own internal transformation. My colleague ACC Phil Davison leads the policing for our communities programme. That delivers a range of benefits, but, ultimately, it involves a new local policing operating model that aims to provide a more consistent, effective and evidence-led way to manage the high volume of demand that we face. To date, it has been shown to provide real benefits. It creates space for our response colleagues by removing a lot of the non-urgent, high-volume demand that is placed on them in an unstructured way. That is managed more consistently. It also provides us with far better calculations for resourcing, so that we know what level of resources we need and where we need them. That is allowing Police Scotland, for the first time, to have a holistic understanding across our local policing divisions of the numbers that we need. It is going live in Edinburgh today, as we speak, and we will continue to evaluate and monitor it.
That new operating model provides benefits, but none of that takes away from the fact that we have delivered massive efficiencies over the years through public sector reform, or from the level of complexity that we are now dealing with.
In simple terms, the chief constable and the executive have a responsibility. We have been entrusted by the Scottish Government with a budget of £1.7 billion. We have more than 22,500 officers and staff. There is always more that we can do to maximise the benefit of that but last year’s budget position is a matter of record. It was put before the committee and the chief constable’s comments are there to read. We are in the process of preparing our budget for this year and engaging with the Scottish Government on that.
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The holistic picture is that there is more that we can do to support our colleagues and we will ultimately put an evidence-based argument to the Scottish Government for investment. However, I am keen to avoid turning it into a hunger games situation with the third sector, the Crown and others. We need a whole-system approach and investment across the system is critical.
I hope that that answers the question.
I have another question for the police. You will be aware of the headlines this week about suspected murderers, rapists and domestic abusers being on the run and there being almost 9,000 outstanding arrest warrants. The focus of this meeting is on domestic abuse. What is being done to apprehend those people?
I can fully understand why headlines such as that cause concern. When you step behind the totality of those warrants, you see that there are different stories at different levels. In Scotland, warrants are used for a range of issues. The category that we focus on most is outstanding warrants for people who are suspected of the most serious offences. We seek to identify and locate them.
If you look at the news, even in the past 10 to 12 months, particularly on serious organised crime, you will see the lengths that Police Scotland, working with the National Crime Agency, has gone to bring offenders back from other jurisdictions and put them in front of Scottish courts. We work exceptionally hard to identify those people, locate them and bring them to justice. Identifying those folks is often really challenging and requires us to work exceptionally hard. They will seek to evade justice, so some of the delays just come down to the fact that people might have left our jurisdiction or might be in hiding. Although we work hard to secure them, that can be difficult.
I assure you that we keep a close focus on the most critical warrants. We have been working with our colleagues in the Crown Office to understand how we better manage that. My colleague ACC Mark Sutherland, in criminal justice, leads on that work.
Although I appreciate that the headline and the headline numbers can cause distress, our commitment and the evidence of what we do show that we work hard to identify and detain those people.
Would a victim of domestic abuse be updated as to what was happening?
I will bring in Adam Brown on the specifics of the processes in respect of domestic abuse.
It is our expectation that victims would be updated at every stage of the process following the apprehension of someone who is wanted on warrant. As the ACC mentioned, it is not infallible and communication across the sector can be a challenge. It can sometimes be a challenge to get hold of victims and update them accordingly. That would be our expectation, but that is not to say that we achieve the gold standard in every case.
Dr Forbes, you answered the question that I was going to ask. I have one more question for the police.
HMICS made 14 recommendations in its 2023 review of Police Scotland’s response to domestic abuse, including recommendations on officers’ understanding of the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018. The inspectorate has since reported that some of those recommendations have been closed. Which of those recommendations have been fully implemented and which remain outstanding?
I will hand over to Adam Brown to give the specifics. The good news is that a large number of those recommendations have been implemented. However, a number remain outstanding, and they are linked to how we deliver consistency of service throughout the country. Those are connected to the policing for our communities programme, which I mentioned earlier.
The second project in that relates to investigations and safeguarding. That is how we deliver, among other things, our tier 2 services that were spoken about earlier—our specialist domestic abuse and criminal investigation department detectives within local policing divisions. We are hopeful that elements of that project will go live as a proof of concept in the next few months but we anticipate that some of the recommendations will stay open until we are able to fully pilot and evaluate the model. That would present the blueprint—much like the local policing model that we just talked about, which has been implemented—and provide the solution that would allow us with confidence to present those recommendations to HMICS for closure.
Adam, do you want to cover that in a bit more detail?
You have covered it well, ACC. Several of the recommendations that remain open are tied up in that ongoing piece of service redesign. We have had updates from HMICS, which views the progress that has been made as positive but wants to see evidence of impact before it closes the recommendations, which is an ongoing process. That includes recommendations on our cadre of SOLOs—sexual offences liaison officers—who engage with victims, as well as some of the other recommendations relating to service design.
Some of the other recommendations just required technological updates to our crime recording system to specify the gender of interviewing officers and in relation to the management of inquiries and cases, and several other recommendations relied on those advancements. That functionality is now in place in the system, but it has been only within the past year that some of that progress has been made.
What is the timescale for evidence of impact?
We are looking at the end of March next year. That is the date that we have put on it, although that is subject to ongoing discussion with HMICS as things change. It is not a fixed target. It can be quite fluid, depending on priorities. However, we are in routine contact with HMICS and, as I say, it is satisfied with the significant progress that we have made.
Good morning. I want to go back briefly to training. The witnesses on the previous panel talked about how important it is to have well-trained officers and Crown Office staff when dealing with folk who are experiencing domestic abuse. Dr Forbes, how effective is the training? How do you evaluate it?
For a long time now, we have had an accredited training course for prosecutors in relation to domestic abuse. The findings of the inspection were that, although the training was good, it was difficult for front-line prosecutors to be released for three days to attend it. Also, prosecutors might have done the introductory domestic abuse course a long time ago or more recently, so, in some cases, there was overlap. Therefore, the recommendation was that we should make the training more modular and find ways of delivering it more flexibly. As a result, we now have regional trainers, so that we can deliver directly to our colleagues in Grampian and the Highlands and Islands, without them coming all the way to Glasgow. We have a hybrid approach, involving online and in-person training.
The revision of the formal domestic abuse training has been evaluated. The Law Society of Scotland insists that all training is evaluated if it is to count for continuing professional development, which is a good incentive, so we always ask for evaluation of our training, and we have had positive evaluation of the domestic abuse training that we have been running.
In addition, while that process was ongoing, I became concerned about some prosecution roles, or some particular areas, and decided that we could, for a short period, provide intensive training. We have been delivering face-to-face training to our prosecutors in our death investigation teams about red flags for domestic homicides and suicides, and we have been delivering specific in-person training on strangulation and its inherent dangers.
Furthermore, our training college has interviewed Fiona McMullen and others for a panel to run a podcast for prosecutors, because we are trying to deliver the messaging in different ways. We are complementing the formal training programme with other means of training and awareness raising. I have gone round the country with a team doing specialist marking training for prosecutors, which has been evaluated very positively. In that training, we have been inviting our prosecutors to prosecute through a risk lens.
As an organisation, we do not risk assess. The police risk assess at the initial outcome, and our specialist advocacy services risk assess, as they are experts in that, but we do not do it.
It is important that prosecutors look at the reports that they receive from the police through a risk lens, so that we can differentiate between a case in which the risk is high and one in which the risk is low. We can then consider what that means for the charges and whether we have the whole picture or only a partial disclosure. That is also important in determining whether, for example, we oppose bail. The new bail test, about which there has been quite a lot of chat this morning, specifically says that the sheriff should have in their mind the risk of harm to the community and to the victim, so it is important that, as prosecutors, we present that information properly. All that training has lived experience embedded in it.
It is good to hear that you deal with other stakeholders on that. Can you speak about training, too?
As Ms McMullen mentioned, there are a lot of similarities with the Crown Office. The domestic abuse matters course that was mentioned is really effective. Before Covid, that was delivered consistently across Police Scotland, but face-to-face training was not possible during Covid, so that was disrupted. We have struggled to retain the levels of training that we would wish to have.
All the challenges for the Crown that Dr Forbes presented are also challenges for Police Scotland. Training is best delivered face to face over a number of days. Delivering that to police officers in a 24/7 operational environment is challenging. We have 11,500 officers in our local policing divisions, and between 6,000 and 7,000 of those are shift workers who need to be available to meet daily demand. That is a challenging and expensive programme to implement, but I firmly believe that that is the standard that we should deliver.
There are financial challenges and other ones. We welcome the reference in the programme for government to supporting policing and ensuring that our folks have front-line skills. In a case of domestic abuse, one of the biggest factors that could indicate a positive outcome for the victim is the quality of the initial contact between them and the police. Such positive outcomes will come about only through effective training. It is expensive and logistically difficult to deliver, but, as we conclude the current violence against women and girls strategy and look forward to delivering the equally safe framework for delivery, it is a key component.
I will ask Adam Brown to comment on some of the other areas in which we have been delivering.
The domestic abuse matters course has been delivered on a limited basis in the past couple of years. The ACC is right—Covid significantly disrupted the ability to deliver that programme, and we have struggled to rebuild what we lost during that year or two.
The plan is to update and reintroduce the training, because there have been legal decisions and landmark cases relating to the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018 in the interim period. The licence for that training package is held by the College of Policing in England and Wales, with which we have discussed some of the means of delivery. The licence stipulates that delivery should be face to face, but we have explored whether there could be a virtual option. That might particularly benefit our remote rural and island communities, because taking an officer away from one of our city divisions in order for that training to be delivered has much less of an impact than taking an officer away from a rural or island community for two or three days, when you factor in travel and accommodation, as the ACC said. We are looking at the delivery of that programme and what we might agree with the College of Policing about how to deliver it.
Fiona McMullen made the good point earlier that this is everyone’s responsibility. We need to look at everything that we do through a domestic abuse lens and, more broadly, through a VAWG lens. In the past year, we have brought our probationer training materials up to date to ensure that coercive control and controlling behaviour are threaded throughout them. To be honest, I did not think that the materials were bad as they were, but the connection between patterns of behaviour and individual offences needed to be made a bit tighter, so we updated that training.
There has been a wider programme of updates to detective training across Police Scotland. We have ensured that my team is at the front door with that, and domestic abuse content is now updated and included not only for new detectives but for senior investigating officers. We already deliver packages to senior investigating officers in relation to domestic abuse, not least given some of the recent legal developments and landmark cases. That work is all ongoing.
In addition, we are trying to fill the gaps in training that the ACC mentioned. We have published six online modules, which are available to all officers across the organisation and cover the implementation and investigation of DASA offences and a number of other areas, including trauma and its effects in domestic abuse cases.
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I am very interested in coercive and controlling behaviour. Are we doing enough to educate the public on that? Challenges remain concerning evidence.
There is a challenge in that regard. Genuinely, it is complex. It is not always easy to recognise, and I go back to what I said about everyone needing to be an expert; it cannot just be left to the specialists. We have public campaigns—the “Don’t be that guy” campaign was mentioned earlier and, last year, our “10 questions for couples” campaign specifically targeted such behaviour in young people to try to raise awareness. It is essential not just that the police, the professionals and the services are aware of such behaviours and how to spot them, but that everyone across the public and the private sectors is aware of them, because this is not a responsibility or an issue that a single agency can deal with on its own. Public awareness is critical.
Absolutely. It is a collective responsibility for everyone.
To return to the budget issue, we have spoken quite a lot about resources. Do you consider that the budget for training is adequate, or do additional resources need to be allocated?
There will be ongoing work to establish that. As we look at the new framework for delivery, that training strand is critical.
As I said, from my reading of the programme for government, there was an acknowledgement of Scottish Government support for police training, and we will discuss that with the Government. Some of this is about prioritising training in the organisation, but we constantly face the challenge that the largest group of officers to train are the hardest to reach and need to understand every new piece of legislation because, on a 24-hour cycle, they could be required to attend a range of calls.
The conversation at the executive level is about prioritising our current training commitments. If we feel that there is a requirement for additional support, we will reach out and call for that. However, it is important to set out our aspiration and belief that the standard that we should be reaching is the one that we previously maintained.
First, I think that I speak for all committee members in saying how indebted we feel to front-line police officers for all that they do.
The motivation for my line of questioning, both last week and this week, is entirely about their welfare, because I have grave concerns, which are shared by many, about what we are asking our police officers to undertake.
Detective Superintendent Brown, when you were asked directly by the convener about 24-hour notification to victims, you did not answer the question. Amanda Bland then asked the same question, to all intents and purposes, and ACC Mairs tried to answer it. It was a very long answer, and I shook my head at the end—we exchanged glances.
I saw that.
You did not answer the question either.
We are simply asking this: in the current scenario, is the 24-hour notification period being adhered to? The answer is no, isn’t it? You are not doing that.
I would dispute that. We are doing it.
Oh, right, you are doing it. You will be able to provide the data to the committee that evidences that all victims are receiving that visit and that notification within 24 hours. Will you do that?
I do not have it to hand, but—
Can you send it to the committee? You are confident—
We can certainly provide a report on—
I will give you a second go at this, because it is so important. Are you confident that the evidence that you will provide to the committee will show that all victims are being visited within 24 hours?
As I said earlier, that is the system and that is the expectation.
No. I asked whether they are being visited. This is the third time of asking. Are you confident? I can see that Assistant Chief Constable Mairs is going to come to your rescue. I am trying to be helpful.
I know.
Tell us the truth. Are victims being visited within 24 hours? Just tell us yes or no.
Not in every case.
Okay. Send us the data.
We look forward to receiving the data on that in written form, because the committee will want to see that. Okay?
Yes.
This is very important to us in the work that we are trying to do on behalf of the justice system. I will defer to Assistant Chief Constable Mairs. You wanted to come in. We exchanged a glance—
We did.
I invite you to tell us the truth about the situation when it comes to resources.
I appreciate that it was a rather long response, Mr Kerr. The summary of that response is that, in many places, a response police officer serving our communities 24/7 will find themselves working in a challenging environment. That was the case 24 years ago, when I joined the service, and it has only got more complex and challenging since then. Ultimately, that is why the chief constable’s budget proposal last year sought additional funding to support those front-line officers.
I do not want to sit here and say that it is for someone else to solve that problem. There is more that the senior leadership in Police Scotland can do with our resources.
I understand that, and that is the kind of leadership response that we would all expect from accountable officers. I respect the answer that you are giving on that score, but we must deal with the realities. In the story in yesterday’s Daily Record, we read that 64 of the arrest warrants in question were outstanding in cases of rape. That compared with 40 in February. Please tell us, if you can—if you cannot, please send the committee the information later—the age of some of those outstanding arrest warrants. For example, is it possible that some of the 40 that were outstanding in February are still among the 64 that are outstanding in September?
I do not have that information to hand, but I will gather it for you. What I can say is that we work hard to deal with those warrants. Some of those warrants could be quite extensive, because, as I have indicated, the offender might have left the country, which poses difficulties. Generally, however, across the board, the imperative is to complete those as quickly as we can. I do not have the information to hand.
I get the point that you are asking about, and I am sure that we can provide the committee with the information.
I do not doubt that no one in Police Scotland is dilly-dallying on any of this. However, the bottom line is that you can only do what you can do with what you have got, and I think that understanding the age aspect of those outstanding arrest warrants will be helpful to the case for the investment that, I believe, Police Scotland absolutely needs in terms of front-line resource.
Adam Brown, I want to ask you the question that I asked the previous panel about counter-allegation. One of the things that came out of the 2023 HMICS report, which is now three and a half years old, was that Police Scotland did not have a formal definition of “counter-allegation”. Does Police Scotland have one now?
Counter complaints are covered in our joint protocol with the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. That sets out clearly the expectations on officers in respect of counter-allegations.
That is not what I am asking. I am asking whether there is a definition, as called for in the 2023 report, in any of the documents that the police work to of what “counter-allegation” is.
There is not a specific definition.
But that is what the report asked for. Why, three and a half years after that report was published, have the police not provided their officers or the organisation in general with a definition of “counter-allegation”? That seems extraordinary.
More important than having a definition is how the process of investigating counter complaints is applied and the guidance that is given to officers on the response. That is included in training. As I said, our joint protocol with the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service is clear about the expectation in those cases.
Yes, but that does not answer my question. Please understand that I am trying to be helpful. I do not know how often I have to say this. There is no definition of “counter-allegation” for the police to work to. That would be a starting point in helping officers to understand what it is and how to recognise it.
How many recommendations were there in that report?
Fourteen.
How many of them are closed?
Six or seven. I will have to double-check.
Can you come back to the committee and tell us precisely which recommendations are closed, which are open and what the deadline dates are for implementation?
Yes, we can certainly do that for you.
Dr Forbes wants to come in on the definition element.
Please do, Dr Forbes.
The joint protocol sets out how Police Scotland and the Crown should deal with counter-allegations. We found that, because of the guidance in the joint protocol, where there were two reports—that is, where the police officer attends an incident and there is, for want of a better expression, a “he said, she said” situation, with both people involved making a report at the same time—police officers are very good at recognising who the primary perpetrator is. That means that the number of cases that come to prosecutors with both parties being reported on the same day is tiny. It is very rare, and there is usually a good reason for it.
We thought that the system was working, but, as time has gone on and our understanding of domestic abuse has improved, especially since the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018 has meant that we are increasingly policing a course of conduct, we have, as Fiona McMullen tried to explain this morning, seen more cases of the justice system being weaponised. Perpetrators understand that, once they have been reported, they can come forward several weeks later and claim that they have been a victim. Because there is a pro-arrest policy and a clear pro-prosecution policy, we will treat that as a new report, and the police officer in that situation is more likely to make a report to us, with the result that the prosecutor then has two cases. That is the situation that we want to get out of.
The Lord Advocate issues guidelines to the chief constable—you might be familiar with them. Some are published, some are unpublished. The Lord Advocate’s guidelines on domestic abuse were issued to police officers this year, and they are unpublished, as our third sector colleagues advised us that they were so detailed and helpful to officers that they would produce a “how-to” manual for perpetrators.
The police now have very clear guidance on what a counter-allegation is, what a malicious report is, what the difference is between them and how they should deal with those situations. Those guidelines from the Lord Advocate are premised on the policing of a course of conduct by looking at that first and looking for incidents only where there is not sufficient evidence of the course of conduct.
There has been a real shift, and the anecdotal feedback that we have had from officers on the ground is that the guidelines are helpful.
That is helpful new information, and I am grateful for that.
Mr Kerr, I know that you have another issue that you want to ask about. I will bring you back in on that later, as I want to bring in Ms McNeill now.
Of course, I would be grateful if I could come back in later.
I want to understand more about bail in general: who gets bail, who does not get bail, what happens with breaches of bail and so on.
Dr Forbes, when the Crown opposes bail, to what extent does the sheriff take that as a factor? Are there lots of cases in which the sheriff will consider that but decides for other reasons that bail will be granted?
As prosecutors, we apply the bail test in the legislation in deciding whether to oppose bail. We look at somebody’s record and at the information that we have in a standard prosecution report. In cases of domestic abuse, the risk assessment information will be particularly important, and we have reframed our training and guidance around that. In court, the prosecutor will present that information. There will be a motion for bail on behalf of the accused, and the prosecutor will then either say that they oppose the motion for bail or that they are not opposed to the motion for bail but are seeking additional conditions to that bail order. In cases of domestic abuse, it would be unusual not to have additional conditions, because we would be looking for protective measures for the victim and any children who are affected by the abuse. We have fairly robust and clear guidelines on that, but the ultimate decision on whether to grant bail is one for the sheriff, and is not really something that I can say more about, I am afraid.
Fraser Gibson might want to add to that.
The starting point in the legislation is that there must be good reason for refusing bail. Therefore, when we think that that is the case, we would make that motion. There is then quite a technical two-stage test within the terms of the legislation that we need to go through to justify someone being remanded in custody.
The first stage of that test looks at, for example, whether there is a risk of someone committing another offence, a risk of their interfering with witnesses or obstructing the course of justice, or a risk of their failing to appear. The second stage, which also must be satisfied, is whether it is in the interests of public safety for them to be remanded or whether there is a significant risk to the interests of justice. We must meet both tests in every case.
The sheriff, too, will hear both sides of the argument. The process in the criminal court is, at the end of the day, an adversarial one, and he will make a decision based on that.
11:45
I am thinking of a number of high-profile cases, including one that I referred to recently in which the family involved called for GPS technology to be one of the factors. I just wonder whether we are missing anything here that we should be doing in criminal justice to try to catch cases where an offender has been bailed and then goes on to kill someone.
The key point of our bail assessment is the assessment of risk, particularly in domestic cases. It is difficult, because ultimately you are trying to predict the future behaviour of another unpredictable human being, and that will never be a science. However, the key things that we will look at are the offence itself; whether it involves violence; and, if so, the level of that violence. Have there been threats? Has there been strangulation, which is a key risk indicator in domestic abuse cases?
We will also look at the individual’s previous convictions and whether their record shows a propensity for violence or, indeed, a propensity to disobey orders of court, which might indicate that this is not a person who can be trusted on bail. If their previous convictions are very serious, that might indicate the level of violence that the person is capable of.
On that point about previous convictions, section 3 of the Bail and Release from Custody (Scotland) Act 2023 repealed section 23D of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995. The Criminal Justice Committee in the previous parliamentary session was certainly told that there were not that many cases in which section 23D would be used. In your opinion as a prosecutor, should we put that section back into the 1995 act, or is it not really needed?
It is perhaps not really for us, as independent prosecutors, to comment on policy, and legislation is a matter for Parliament to enact and for yourselves as MSPs to decide on.
My memory of section 23D is that it applied where the person had a previous conviction and was on indictment for analogous offences in certain categories, typically violence. In other words, you were dealing with someone who had had a serious conviction for violence and was proceeding through court on another such charge. One would hope that, under the current bail test, such a person would still be remanded, but I do not have any statistics in that respect.
Nevertheless, the key point is the assessment of risk. The key factor for us in assessing domestic abuse cases is, as Dr Forbes has said, that domestic risk assessment.
That should be assessed, regardless.
The previous test was predicated on somebody having offended in a serious way before. The new test takes a principled approach and looks at risk; it applies to all cases, but it ought to be a useful tool in domestic abuse cases, especially.
You have talked about the gap. We think that the gap arises where there is no advocacy support. We need to ensure that we have the best risk information that we can get when we go to court but, as we know, and as all the studies show, the risk information that a front-line police officer gets is not as accurate as the information that a domestic abuse court advocate gets, because the officer does not have the same amount of time and there is not the same level of trust. The relationship just has a different dynamic; the training is also different, and it is the advocate's job. Because of that dynamic, the risk information that an advocate gets is much more detailed than the risk information that anyone else can provide. Therefore, in order to be equipped in the best way, we rely on advocacy services.
However, there are also gaps in the family and civil courts, and there are risks there that we do not always know about, because the communication between the two justice systems is not clear enough. I know—and welcome the fact—that the Scottish Law Commission is looking at that. If you are asking about gaps, I think that that is where they are.
That was really helpful, because this is a common thread. There are also cases going through the civil courts, but there is no crossover, and those cases could be very telling when it comes to looking at risk factors.
I want to understand what happens when bail is breached. I assume that if the accused breaches bail by going to the victim’s house—which they should not be doing, as that would be a clear breach—there will be an immediate response, rather than the 24-hour response that you talked about in response to Stephen Kerr’s questions.
Yes, because we would be talking about a crime in progress. Every police response is subject to the threat, harm, risk, investigation, vulnerability and engagement—or THRIVE—process in our control room and assessed for potential risk and harm, and officers will be deployed accordingly. However, breach of bail is a criminal offence in its own right and results in automatic arrest.
The police would attend that immediately.
Yes.
Right. Would that happen only if the offender was at the victim’s house? If the person were seen near the victim’s house, would that be dealt with the same severity?
It would be subject to the THRIVE process, which is undertaken in our control room. The call handler will assess the threat, harm and risk associated with what has been reported. It is very difficult to say exactly what the speed of response would be in different contexts, because a breach of bail could include communications, text and SMS messages and that sort of thing. Each case would be determined on its own merits by the control room and prioritised accordingly.
A physical presence would be regarded as requiring an urgent response.
It potentially would be, absolutely. In addition, there will be markers on people’s addresses that we can apply, which give officers and controllers quick access to information on the risk that might be presented there. If a breach of bail is in progress, you can expect a prompt response from the police.
You were asked about resources earlier. Perhaps I can give you a specific example. In last week’s evidence session, we talked about the amount of police time that is taken up dealing with mental health calls. I know that work is ongoing on that, but, in reality, officers might be sitting in accident and emergency with a person in distress at the same time as a call goes out requiring an urgent response to a breach of bail involving a domestic abuse victim. Is that correct?
That is exactly correct, and I suppose that that is the area where I wanted to connect last week’s evidence session with this week’s. Last week, my colleague Catriona Paton talked about some of the areas where we feel that the police are overcommitted and where we are not the right service to provide the support that vulnerable people need. This week, we are talking about those areas where we absolutely are the right service. The two are completely connected.
I know, but there is a question that I have to ask you. When Brian McInulty was here last week, talking about this from the police point of view, I have to say that I was not at all satisfied that enough progress is being made on the matter. We have seen an increase in domestic violence, and we have had horrendous cases of bail breaches that have resulted in women being murdered. Adam Brown mentioned this earlier, but we are all too well aware of the pressures on policing. Officers, frankly, are wondering whether they want to continue in the service. I think that there is a crisis here. Do you think that enough progress has been made in relieving police officers from such activity? I think that it is the top reason why we do not have police officers on the front line.
I talked about this earlier. You join the police to help people in crisis and to make a difference, but too many of our officers are finding themselves caught up in these other tasks and functions—
Is enough being done to deal with that situation?
We all set high standards. We need to do more, and we need to move at pace. We are doing an awful lot, but we hear the voices of our officers on the front line, saying that they feel tired and frustrated at the barriers in their way. Some of those barriers are within the gift of Police Scotland to remove, and we have talked about the new model that we are delivering, but others rely on partnerships and other elements and are really challenging and complex to manage.
As for whether we are doing enough, I come back to the focus of today’s evidence session and why we welcome this discussion. Violence against women and girls is a national threat, just as terrorism is.
Exactly, so I would be expecting you to say that your partners are not doing enough. I know that a lot is being done, but it is just not going fast enough. Surely you must think that.
I do, and you heard as much from our third sector partners earlier. I do not want to speak for Emma Forbes and other colleagues, but those of us who are responsible for delivering these front-line services are feeling the same sense of urgency. We are deeply concerned about this; the chief constable has spoken out, as has the First Minister and the leaders of all the parties, about how urgent this is. We need only think of the response to serious organised crime or terrorism; had 12 people died as a result of, say, the violence associated with serious organised crime over the past 12 months, it would have been on the front page of every paper, and it would be dominating everybody’s minds. Twelve people have lost their lives as a result of homicides linked to former or current partners in the last 12 months—this is serious, and it is real.
With respect, I know all that. I am just trying to make it clear that I have a real concern that we are not going fast enough in freeing up the officers whom we need to attend these kinds of calls.
If there is a breach of bail, does what happens to the person in question depend on the severity of the breach? Does the matter automatically go back to court?
It does, because breaching bail is a criminal offence. The question is whether the breach requires an urgent response or something less imminent. The outcome, though, is that we will investigate the matter, and someone will be arrested.
In some cases, the breach of bail will be one of a number of offences—there could be an assault or other things involved.
Thank you.
I want to bring in some other colleagues, if I may, beginning with Ms Chapman.
Thank you all for your contributions so far. I just want to take a step back and ask a higher-level, more conceptual question of Police Scotland and the Crown. What does success look like for you in a domestic abuse case? I will start with Tim Mairs, if I may.
That is the issue that sits at the heart of this. When we come into contact with a victim/survivor, the trauma-informed approach that we take is really about understanding where they are and what those outcomes look like. In some cases, the outcome will be immediate safeguarding, and signposting to allow them to make a decision about their circumstances, with support from the police and third sector. Other cases will involve a criminal justice outcome, but as Dr Forbes has said, that is a very challenging route, and the experience can be traumatising.
At a high level, then, we see success as our having a positive interaction with the victim/survivor that leads to a life-changing moment for them and their being able to move out of that abusive environment. It is that balance that we have to strike, and it is why we always must be cautious when we look purely at criminal justice statistics in isolation. Criminal justice outcomes do not always necessarily result in a positive experience; they might have required a victim/survivor to go to court and be retraumatised and be exposed to the perpetrator, and that might not be something that is desirable. For me, then, it is all about having that more holistic, person-centred approach.
I put the same question to Emma Forbes. What does success look like to you?
Overall, it would look like a decrease in the number of cases that we were prosecuting. At the moment, Police Scotland is reporting a record-high number of cases to us, and we are all concerned about that; indeed, the prevalence of strangulation is particularly pernicious and concerning. This is a really difficult time to be a prosecutor.
However, when it comes to what success looks like in individual cases, I would say that the best person to ask would be somebody with lived experience of the process. Therefore, instead of answering as a prosecutor, I will have to borrow what I have learned from them, because I just do not know.
I think that, for them, success is trust in the justice system and their knowing that, when they report to us, as prosecutors and police officers, we will listen and take what they say very seriously. It is knowing that there is a robust prosecution policy in place that means that domestic abuse is an absolute priority for the prosecution in Scotland and for our police officers. It is, as Fiona McMullen has said, working together with our third sector colleagues to provide, as best we can, a multi-agency response.
Success is also about cases not taking as long as they do and a reduction in justice journeys. That is an issue that we are really struggling with, because of court backlogs, court timetabling and the dual time bar that we are about to hit in the autumn.
12:00
A better prosecution service would be one that provided shorter justice journeys and delivered, throughout a case, timely updates in the way in which the victim had asked them to be delivered—by their preferred means of communication—and in a trauma-informed way. We are doing a lot of work to embed trauma-informed practice. I feel as though that is at risk of becoming a buzzword, but we do not want it to be. A survivor of childhood abuse recently gave me good advice that the best way to teach people about trauma is not to mention the word “trauma.” It is about being more emotionally tuned in, trying not to do any harm and meeting the needs of the victim at each stage of the prosecution process. We have refurbished all of our witness rooms so that they provide a more inviting environment and are, I hope, a less scary place to be. We have learned a lot from the bairns’ hoose model and others as we have developed our approach. We have trained prosecutors in how they should speak to, and more important, how they should listen to victims of domestic abuse.
I prefer stories to numbers, but I have some numbers on the impact of our summary case management. We are talking about police officers being able to do what we need them to do—in the past year, 100,000 fewer police officers have been cited to give evidence because of summary case management. Three thousand fewer children have been cited to give evidence. At the post-pandemic peak, we were scheduling 7,685 domestic abuse trials in Scotland, but that figure is now down to 2,005. If we measure that not against the peak but against the historical baseline, that represents a 30 per cent reduction. That means that we are citing fewer domestic abuse victims and their children to come to court if they will not be giving evidence on that day.
As I told the previous Criminal Justice Committee, we would proceed to trial in 13 per cent of such cases before SCM was introduced. That meant that one in 10 victims would have their case go to trial, but the whole process was geared up to supporting them up to a date that might never happen—in all likelihood, it would not happen. There has been a combination of earlier resolution, because of the way in which cases are managed, and bringing people to court to give evidence only on the day when the trial is going ahead.
I hope that success looks like fewer adjourned dates, less churn in the system, shorter justice journeys and listening prosecutors. That should all be underpinned by a robust commitment to tackling domestic abuse.
You have both given quite aspirational answers, which is useful, because we can work back from those aspirations when thinking about what needs to change.
Emma Forbes, in response to an earlier question, you said that the Law Society requires the training that prosecutors receive to be evaluated. Does the evaluation include feedback from survivors?
We have provided all prosecutors with trauma-informed practice training, but we want to have an accredited course for those who deal with victims and witnesses each day. We have just run a pilot of that, and a survivor participated in the course and gave us feedback. We will have ongoing meetings with her to receive further feedback. Psychologists and those from the third sector were also involved. In relation to the recent domestic abuse marking training, Fiona McMullen came along and gave feedback. We have to be sensitive about how we engage, because we do not want to be tokenistic. We are very careful about how and when we engage with individual survivors. Often, it can help to use third sector colleagues, because they can lend a voice and help us in that regard.
That is helpful. In different ways, you have all spoken about the importance of the relationship with third sector colleagues and those who provide independent advocacy and support. You have said that they are crucial in allowing the system to work at all. We should not ask too much of survivors by asking them to fix the system as well as to go through it. That would not be fair, and it would not be an example of a harm reduction approach.
I turn to Tim Mairs. You have already answered questions about responding to the recommendations from the 2023 HMICS inspection. In trying to do better for survivors, what work are you and your officers doing to build trust with communities that, for multiple and complex reasons, might not trust the police, might not feel that they would get a compassionate response from them or might not want to engage with them at all? How are you dealing with those issues?
Clearly, that is a complex space. My colleague ACC Catriona Paton, who gave evidence to the committee last week and who leads the policing together work, does an awful lot of work involving the use of dedicated community engagement specialists, who are not police officers, who are able to build such relationships. We constantly scan and try to understand, by looking at the demographics and undertaking critical activity such as engagement, which groups we need to seek to build those relationships with. A lot of collaborative working is done by the national specialists and our local colleagues. The most effective relationships that I have seen started on a one-to-one basis at a national level but have now been transferred over to local policing.
One example is the work with the black and African community, with which we undertook some very targeted engagement. There is a big gap in confidence in that community as a result of the death of Sheku Bayoh. A lot of work has been done nationally, which is now starting to translate into strong local relationships. We have clear evidence that that has allowed us to better understand and to collaboratively navigate challenges around gender-based violence in a range of communities.
I turn to Adam Brown. With regard to the impact of that work and, more broadly, of the work on implementation of the recommendations of the HMICS report, you mentioned that you expect evidence of that to come out at the end of March next year. If we are looking to rebuild trust, to minimise harm and to ensure that there are positive interactions with Police Scotland, how are you assessing the impact on victims/survivors of the implementation of those recommendations?
Because we acknowledge that it is difficult for people who have not had the best experience to engage with us, we are quite reliant on our partner agencies to carry out such evaluation. Scottish Women’s Aid and ASSIST share their bulletins and feedback from their helplines with us. We have an online portal, which is anonymous, through which victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence can provide responses. Our insight and engagement teams assess all that information, and we pull it all together so that we can tease out patterns with regard to where we are not doing as well as we should be. That is an ongoing process.
In addition to that, there will be what some might argue is the less valuable stuff such as the information on numerical compliance with recommendations such as the one on specifying the gender of the interviewing officer. Although that information is less helpful, it still provides insight.
With regard to your question about how we deal with victims, the other routes are the most valuable to us.
Okay—
I am sorry, but I need to bring in Mr Macpherson, as we are quite tight for time.
We have heard a lot this morning about the implementation of the 2018 act and the 2021 act. We have also heard about the demand on the service as a whole, whether the police, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service or the courts, and the requirement and the desire for more financial resources, as well as more staffing and, perhaps, more time. In that context, is there a need for some breathing space with regard to the implementation of legislation?
We have a proposition in the programme for government for a misogyny bill, for which there is broad parliamentary support. Such a bill would be dealt with by this committee. Given what colleagues around the table have said, is there a need to recognise that we must fully implement and embed pieces of legislation that have been passed in recent years before we place any further demands on services?
I will give you a bit of a political answer to the first part of that. We will look forward to engaging on individual pieces of legislation and to providing our views on them. I was persuaded by the view that it is always helpful to start with what is already on the books and ensure that we are getting the most out of that.
The legislative discussion is one to have, but the leadership that is shown across society is the most critical piece. Today, we are talking about occasions when we have failed to prevent such violence through early intervention, but we have also touched on some of that early intervention. This national threat that we are all collectively addressing requires that leadership and societal shift.
Colleagues earlier talked about the “that guy” campaign. On Friday, we are launching the next phase of that, which focuses on men being positive role models for young boys and younger men, setting out what the expectations are in a positive way. That does not require legislation, and it does not necessarily require resourcing. It requires a continuation of that collective leadership across party and society.
I hope that that is not dodging the question. We will engage with the legislation, and we need to make the most of what we have. However, collective societal leadership, particularly by men modelling to younger boys and men what it means to be a good citizen, is critical.
Absolutely. Social change and changes to attitudes are fundamental. We all have a role, as you said, in providing leadership and contributing to that, including by sharing experiences and being proactive in the communities in which we live.
I emphasise that the proposition for a misogyny bill is a good and important one, and I look forward to scrutinising that legislation and making it as good as possible. My point was that, although I appreciate that the 2018 act has been impactful and effective in many ways, parts of the 2021 act have yet to be implemented, as you have mentioned. Do we, as legislators, need to consider that before placing further legislative demands on the service?
Yes. In simple terms, for us, this is about having a whole-system assessment of new legislation. What are the implications for the agencies that have to deliver it? Training implications come with resource and time commitments. There would also be potential changes to processes and the costs that come with them. There remains a risk that, although good legislation is passed, due to the necessary processes, resourcing and funding not following through, it can create challenges for agencies and lead to detrimental outcomes.
We welcome a number of the recommendations in the programme for government around consultation on some existing legislation. We have already engaged with the Scottish Government on challenges that we see with provisions of the 2021 act, and we look forward to re-engaging in that conversation.
I do not know whether Dr Forbes or Mr Gibson would like to add anything from the Crown’s perspective.
We associate ourselves with ACC Mairs’s answer. He put it well. It is about striking a balance between how soon legislation needs to come in and the work that we are doing at the moment with our existing resources, alongside the additional resource implications of change and the amount of change that we are going through at the same time. It is a balancing act.
We engage with the Scottish Government on implementation dates, but it is always a balancing act. I guess that that is not unique to the justice sector. When the Parliament makes changes in any sector, that is presumably always a consideration for it.
We have passed a lot of criminal justice-related legislation over the past decade, though. I am cognisant of that.
I will bring this session to a close at 20 past 12. I have two colleagues who have sought to catch my eye for brief supplementary questions, so we have five minutes. It is up to each of them to work together. I will start with Ms Bland and finish with Mr Kerr.
12:15
My question is for clarification. If I have misunderstood, please guide me. ACC Mairs, you described the domestic abuse matters training as expensive and logistically difficult to deliver, and you have talked about plans to reinstate the training. I want to understand what percentage of officers are trained. Are you confident that every Police Scotland officer across Scotland is trained to identify and react appropriately to the complexities of domestic abuse?
We will provide you with the numbers. Because we have not consistently delivered the training since Covid times, and due to the turnover rate in local policing, people will have moved through the organisation and the numbers will have dwindled. We will seek to provide the numbers to you in writing.
As Adam Brown mentioned, a number of officers were trained pre-Covid, so they will still have the knowledge and experience. A large proportion of our officers are probationers who have come through the Scottish Police College, and everyone who has gone through the Police College will have received the initial training. Our specialist detectives also receive training and input. Domestic abuse matters allows us to set a really high standard—that is our aspiration, and we feel that it is critical. We will get you the numbers and provide you with an overview on that.
Thank you. We look forward to receiving that.
I will bring in Ms Chapman for a brief question at the end—she is experiencing significant generosity from the central belt today. However, I will bring in Mr Kerr first.
This will be quite brief, too. There is now a statutory domestic homicide and suicide review system, which was implemented as of April. Prior to that, Police Scotland conducted internal reviews. My question is, I think, for DS Adam Brown. How many domestic homicide reviews did Police Scotland conduct before the statutory scheme began?
Over what time period? We will have to get back to you with that data but, if you give us some dates, we can provide it.
That is good.
My other questions are allied to that first one, and I am happy for you to come back to the committee on them, too. How many of those reports involved the families, the next of kin or the survivors? How many reports were then provided to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service? Was any of them published? What was the policy that guided Police Scotland on whether the findings should be disclosed to the families? No doubt, you had a policy on that. That information would be useful for the committee in understanding how it all works.
We can provide that.
Thank you.
I apologise to whoever has to produce these letters at Police Scotland, as they are going to be very busy in the coming days.
Ms Chapman has the final question.
I appreciate your indulgence, convener.
Very quickly, I want to go back to Marie McNair’s questions on coercion and coercive control. Victims are being asked more and more to document their own abuse. How do police officers ensure that digital evidence gathering, in particular, does not make victims the investigators of their own abuse? How do you navigate that line?
It is difficult, because so much offending is perpetrated in the digital or online world and, unfortunately, the reality of that is that the evidence is often captured in victims’ devices.
You could probably have a committee just to discuss digital issues. It is not my area of expertise, but our cyber and fraud unit is doing a huge amount of work to upskill front-line officers. The principle is similar to that with domestic abuse, in that it is not just the remit of specialists; it needs to be everyone’s responsibility. That unit does a lot of work to upskill front-line officers through knowledge hubs and training on the digital sharing of evidence. We now have digital evidence sharing capability and can capture evidence directly from victims’ phones without having to seize the phones. It is an unfortunate symptom of the type of offending that we are seeing that, inevitably, victims’ devices will capture some of the evidence that we need. Our focus is on minimising the need to take those devices away, because they are critical to people’s safety in many ways.
That is not a complete answer, but it is a complex issue.
It is helpful, because it gives us points that we can explore further in other sessions.
That issue speaks to the challenge and tension in the justice system around the fact that an extensive investigation can be intrusive and impactful. The key fulcrum that we move around is that of being trauma informed and taking a bespoke approach.
Before the committee moves into private session, I extend our thanks to all our witnesses for the service that you provide in the pursuit of justice—it is much appreciated. Although we will question you on some areas, we recognise the significant public service that you provide. Please accept our heartfelt thanks.
12:20
Meeting continued in private until 12:41.