Official Report 685KB pdf
09:00
Our second item of business is an evidence session on the Scottish Government’s priorities for the justice portfolio. This is the first of two planned evidence sessions with the Cabinet Secretary for Justice as part of the committee’s wider consideration of justice priorities.
We are delighted to be joined today by the cabinet secretary, Neil Gray MSP, and by Catriona Dalrymple, director for justice, and Donald McGillivray, director for safer communities, from the Scottish Government. They are all very welcome.
I understand that the cabinet secretary has a police memorial event to attend later today, which means that we have a set finishing time for the meeting. On behalf of the committee, I ask the cabinet secretary to pass on our very best wishes to everyone at that event and to thank our public servants for the work that they do in keeping us safe. I know that time will be tight, but we will have a longer meeting with the cabinet secretary next month.
The cabinet secretary is going to make an opening statement of around three minutes before we go to questions.
Thank you, deputy convener. I appreciate everyone’s flexibility, given my attendance at Tulliallan later this morning. I welcome the opportunity for early engagement with the committee and look forward to working with you during this session of Parliament. I also wish the convener well and hope that he makes a swift recovery.
I say at the outset that we can be immensely proud of many aspects of our justice system. We have a strong and independent legal system with a focus on human rights, fairness and justice. Crime, including violent crime, is down by almost half since 1991. Dwelling fires and fatalities are significantly down and backlogs in the summary courts are significantly reduced.
The system faces major challenges, both societal and in its capacity and capability. We are seeing increasing vulnerability, the polarisation of debate and heightened community tensions, and increased demand in key parts of the system.
If we are to maintain confidence in the system, justice must change to reflect those challenges. I will focus on three areas in this session of Parliament. First, justice is, at its heart, about people. Many people have contact with the justice system when something negative has already happened to them or to their community, so a key part of my mission is to prevent those problems happening in the first place. After a long-term and significant reduction in crime, we have seen a recent rise, driven by some specific issues including sexual offences, domestic abuse, violent crime and retail crime.
I view violence against women and girls with particular concern, both because of the nature of the offending and because of the worrying trends that we continue to see. The First Minister has made clear his intention to provide personal leadership and to take action across Government to address that pernicious situation by supporting survivors, strengthening protection, making perpetrators accountable, changing behaviour and tackling technology-facilitated online harm.
In the past 20 to 30 years we have seen dramatic reductions in the most serious type of non-sexual violence, with homicide at a record low. However, we have seen increases in other types of violence. The Government is therefore committed to refreshing its violence prevention strategy later this year, with a strong focus on prevention and deterrence across all areas of social policy, including substance dependency, mental health, family support, employability, education and others that are crucial to the prevention effort.
My second priority is to improve the experience of people who find themselves in the justice system. The Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Act 2025 and the Criminal Justice Modernisation and Abusive Domestic Behaviour Reviews (Scotland) Act 2025, both of which were passed during the previous session of Parliament, show our commitment to that work, but there is more to do. There will be a focus on implementing that legislation and on ensuring that victims and survivors can have their voices heard and that they receive the right information at the right time and in a way that they can understand. Modernisation, including the implementation of the sexual offences court and an increase in digitisation, is also needed to address unnecessary delay and inefficiency within the system and to respond to the growing volume of cases in the High Court.
My final priority relates to prisons. The prison population is too high and is growing at an unsustainable rate and the issues that the Scottish Prison Service faces continue to increase in complexity. The main drivers of those issues are the growth in the long-term sentence population, the volume of sexual offences in the system, and the approach that is required to tackle serious and organised crime. Serious action has been taken to prosecute in those areas, for which I will not apologise. However, we are taking action to build two new prisons and to maximise existing capacity. We will take account of the views that have come through our recent consultation exercise to consider what more can be done to ensure that our prisons remain safe for those who live and work in them, while maintaining public confidence and ensuring the safety of victims and survivors in the wider community.
All those challenges are interconnected, which is why we need an approach that looks at the system as a whole and is focused on the principles of public sector reform. There are many other areas that I hope to have the opportunity to discuss during the committee’s questions this morning, including important commitments on legal aid, social impact investment and fire and rescue.
Thank you, Mr Gray. I appreciate your remarks. I will pick up on a number of things with my opening questions.
You rightly mentioned some of the major challenges, particularly around vulnerability. The number of over-65s in prison has increased by more than 100 per cent in the past 10 years. What is the Scottish Government’s strategy for dealing with the increasingly older prison population? Is it morally right and a good use of taxpayers’ money to incarcerate someone who has advanced dementia and does not have the cognitive capacity to understand that they are being punished or rehabilitated?
That is a significant challenge that we face, which we are carefully considering. We need to have a conversation about how we deal with the consequences of the increase in our long-term prisoner population and the increase in the age of that population. In addition, the Crown has been incredibly successful at prosecuting historical sexual offences, which means that a number of long-term prisoners arrive when they are older than they would be if they had been prosecuted at the time of the offence.
The two new prisons that we are constructing to replace HMP Barlinnie and HMP Inverness are adapting to meet those demands and will have larger cells, in some cases, to ensure that social care and health provision can be provided. Part of our consultation on penal reform is about what prison is for. Of course, prison has to be there in order to provide a significant deterrent, and I will not apologise for the fact that average sentences have increased. However, we also need to consider what prison is for, which is a debate that we will be having in the committee as well as in the Parliament in due course.
I want to talk about throughcare work, particularly in the context of public sector reform, which you touched on and which was mentioned heavily yesterday in the programme for government. When I met Sacro recently, it told me that, in year 1 of its Upside programme, 40 per cent of prisoners who it supported in its throughcare work were statutorily homeless on their release, even when the programme sought to engage with local authority homelessness casework teams 12 weeks out from the prisoner’s liberation date. What steps will you take to ensure that one arm of the state does not collide with another and end up kneecapping returning citizens the minute they walk out of the prison gate?
Ensuring that we have joined-up and interconnected services is absolutely critical to our approach to public service reform. It is at the heart of what the First Minister set out to the Parliament yesterday in the programme for government. It is also at the heart of Ivan McKee’s work, which will ensure that we are reforming and rewiring the state so that services work better together and are more joined up and moulded around the individual. A significant amount of that work will play out in the course of this parliamentary session.
If I am to be successful in my work to reduce the number of victims becoming victims in the first place, that has to be about our expansion of social policy in terms of public protection and our moving to a more preventative system. That includes expanding housing support and social care and support for mental health, substance dependency and families. The entire system needs to be rewired to ensure that we are moving support further upstream. That is certainly what I will be driving at in my conversations with Cabinet colleagues.
I appreciate that the public sector reform piece will take some time, but could I ask you to go away and consider, in the short term, working with the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers and your colleagues in the housing department? Could they look at sending some sort of information to local authority homelessness teams to ensure that Upside workers are not being told, “Just bring the person down on a Friday afternoon and we will sort it out”? That is not working at the moment. Will you undertake to do that, cabinet secretary?
Some of that work is already ongoing. I convene a regular meeting of justice partners to ensure that we reduce the need for short-term remand and provide bail accommodation—indeed, the bail accommodation pilot is under way. Again, I come back to the point that it is about ensuring that our local authority partners, as well as wider justice partners, are working together to mould our services around the individual, rather than the other way round. In light of what you said about the work being done by Sacro—of which I am very appreciative—I will take that issue away, and we can examine it with SPS and local government colleagues.
That is appreciated.
My final question touches more on a policing issue. I know that I will not be the only member of this committee who is increasingly getting complaints from constituents—in my case, plenty from the Garrowhill area—who see young men dressed head to toe in black, sometimes wearing a face covering, zooming around on souped-up e-bikes and e-scooters. That activity is highly dangerous and is sometimes connected with drugs and organised crime, as has been demonstrated in the recent operation armour pilot. Constituents in Glasgow and, indeed, further afield want to know what the Scottish Government is doing to crack down on the antisocial behaviour and criminality associated with e-bikes and e-scooters. When are we going to get a grip on the issue?
That is an issue that I am contending with in my own constituency, and I believe that all members across Parliament will be contending with the issue in their local communities. I have met Police Scotland and have asked directly what it needs from a devolved powers perspective so that it is enabled to capture and deter that type of behaviour.
There are two parts to this, one of which is the culture that we are talking about—that is, people dressed all in black, with balaclavas on. There is also a cross-section with football hooliganism, violence against women and girls, antisocial behaviour and organised criminal activity, and we have much more work to do to support what is a minority of young boys—I would point out that it is certainly an issue with young boys that we are facing. The majority of young men in Scotland are fine, upstanding citizens—good, law-abiding folk who set an example for others—but we have an issue that is being fuelled by online misogynistic behaviour, and we need to get in and amongst the more preventative space, provide diversionary activity and allow some space for hope and inspiration. That is part of the answer to all elements of that cross-sectional issue.
As I have said, I am working with the police on the powers that they need to deter this activity. It is not just e-bikes and e-scooters that we are talking about, but off-road bikes and quad bikes. That work is under way, and I hope to be able to have news for colleagues on it in due course.
I also need to work with colleagues in the United Kingdom Government, because more could, should and must be done around the licensing of these vehicles so that the police’s work in tracking and detaining individuals and their vehicles can be progressed. That is another issue that I will be taking forward.
I will now pass over to my colleague Ms McNeill from Glasgow.
Good morning. I note that
“Across all scenarios, the prison population is expected to increase, with the average daily population in March 2027 projected to be anywhere between 8,100 and 9,150.”
I know that you know the figures, because that was a quote from your letter to us.
I will set the scene by highlighting my interest here, which is perhaps an interest of other members and is, I am sure, an interest of yours, cabinet secretary. How are we going to provide alternatives to prison? What new programmes have been developed in relation to community sentences? How far down the road are we in that respect? Can you just be open about that?
Yes. This is all about giving the courts and those prosecuting criminality confidence around community disposals. We have a very strong position that we can build on with the very high rate of compliance with community disposals—I think that the figure in that respect is around 90 per cent. I want to build on that by expanding justice social work as well as expanding the community and voluntary sector, which often provides the facilities and programmes for delivering these kinds of community disposals.
This is also about expanding monitoring and bail conditions, and ensuring that those who preside over criminal cases are given the confidence to put more of that work into the community setting rather than into short-term sentences. All the evidence shows that short-term prison sentences result in a higher level of reoffending than community disposals.
Once people enter the prison system, it becomes much harder for us to extract them from it. I would therefore prefer that, when it is proportionate and safe, we use community disposals much more than short-term sentences.
09:15
To be honest, you did not say anything that I disagree with, and I could have said the same about previous cabinet secretaries. However, I am interested in what exactly you are doing to change the process. The debate about this goes back decades. Therefore, you need to be more forthcoming in telling us what work has been done.
I understand what you said about giving confidence, but what about programmes? Has there been an expansion in the number of programmes, or do you plan to expand them? How will you go about doing that during this parliamentary session?
I appreciate Ms McNeill’s question. I point her to yesterday's statement on the programme for government and the document that set out how the work will be delivered. There will be expansions to justice social work and support for community and voluntary organisations to provide those programmes.
That work is in progress. We are working with Community Justice Scotland on it, and I have also met the chief social work adviser. The work is currently in development and we are setting it in train. It has not been completed yet, but neither has consideration of the consultation responses, so we have not taken any firm decisions on how we rewire the system.
Regardless of the decisions that are taken on penal reform, we have already started work to ensure that there is more capacity available.
I want to be clear about what you have said. Do you mean that it is work in progress? I am looking for an answer to that. I am not trying to catch you out in any way. I just want to know.
No, I am looking to be—
I have an interest in the work, too, and I believe in its aims. I would just like the Government to be clear about where we are on it.
I look forward to working with Pauline McNeill and other colleagues on the delivery of the work. A lot of the information will come through when budget allocations arrive, and I look forward to working with colleagues at that point.
On a similar subject, GPS technology is very important in scenarios that involve a home detention curfew. If victims are to have confidence in the system, it is important to know the whereabouts of people who might pose a risk. How far down the road are we on increasing the capacity for home detention curfews?
We have almost doubled the number of offenders who are subject to home detention curfews during recent months. I have supported the Scottish Prison Service with its risk-based assessments on home detention curfews, and there has been an increase in the number of them. As Ms McNeill will be aware, the number of those was restricted previously. I am looking to expand that work and have better monitoring in place.
Ms McNeill talked about GPS technology. We are considering the use of technology not only in relation to home detention curfews but also for bail monitoring, when it is available for that use.
We want to ensure that we do all we can to support people in the right places and work with them in the right ways. However, critically—and this was a central theme to the discussion that I had with victims organisations during the summer, as part of the consultation process—we want to ensure that victims are given confidence in their safety as well. I consider that to be of paramount importance in the work that we are doing.
On a separate subject, I am pleased about the programme for government's inclusion of doing serious work on violence against women and girls. I think that we all have the same aims on that subject.
The commitment to a sexual offences court was part of the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Act 2025. However, the Crown Office warned last week that it is concerned that it will not have the resource to make it happen. My understanding is that the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service has been doing the work for that and is committed to it. When can we expect a sexual offences court to be created?
We are all doing that work, because we are all committed to it: the Lord President, the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service, the Crown and the Government. I have met individually and jointly with all concerned to see how we can make progress.
I also want us to meet with victims organisations so that they can envisage how a sexual offences court can match what we are able to deliver. That work is ongoing. The letter from the Crown Agent says that the resources are not there because there has been no request for additional resources. The work is not anticipated to come through until next financial year.
This is a complex area where it will be difficult to deliver. The reform and change is substantial, it is necessary and I support it, but I do not underestimate the challenge. I will work with all the partners I have mentioned to ensure that we get it delivered.
Good morning, cabinet secretary, and thank you for what you have said so far. There are lots of things that we could cover, but I wish to focus initially on prisons. What is the Scottish Government’s target prison population for sustainability?
At the minute we are sitting with a prison population beyond 8,500, with a design capacity of 7,800. That will give Ms Chapman a sense of the challenge that we are currently facing.
I understand the challenge, but that is not an answer to my question. How many people do you think Scotland should be imprisoning?
That will largely depend on the business that comes through the courts. I want to ensure that the courts have the capability to incarcerate people who pose a risk to society, and I will not apologise for the fact that average sentences have increased. It is right for sentences to match the seriousness of the criminality that we have faced.
However, I believe that we are substantially beyond the level of incarceration that we should be at. That is partly because it has been driven by the long-term prisoner population; it is also because of continuing short-term sentences and the challenge that we face with remand. I have set out what the design capacity is, and that will change with the two new prisons coming on stream in the coming months—HMP Glasgow and HMP Highland—as well as the work that is under way to increase capacity, which I am currently considering.
I suppose the point of my question is: if we are not sure what our target is, how do we know whether penal reform is working? I understand what you say about current capacity and projected capacity with the new prisons coming on stream. HMP Glasgow is supposed to deliver an extra 350 places at a cost of £1 billion or thereabouts. If we invested even half of that in prevention, could we shift from a problem of accommodation to a genuine admissions control policy? We are not controlling what is going in.
I very much understand and appreciate the point that Ms Chapman is making. In principle, I largely support what she is saying in many ways. We need to move upstream, and we need to prevent people from becoming victims in the first place. However, we must also have capacity in the prison system to ensure that we are still capable of incarcerating those who pose the most significant risk to society. That is a critical part of our justice system that needs to remain. I do not think that it would be wise to set a target for what that incarceration level should be, as it will fluctuate depending on the business that comes through the courts and on levels of criminality.
The basic principle that I think Ms Chapman is driving at is one of prevention: preventing people from becoming victims in the first place and preventing criminality happening. Of course I support that, that is the work that we will be seeking to deliver on, and that is a key target of mine.
You talk about penal reform: what does the success story there look like?
Fewer victims.
Okay. How, then, are Government policy and the allocation of resources following that—
Again, deputy convener—
If I could just finish. If what we define as a prison problem is a problem of failure elsewhere—of youth services, mental health services and all those things—will we see, and will you commit to, a shift of resource away from the prison problem and towards that upstream complexity around mental health, poverty, inequality and those drivers?
Yes. My response here is similar to the one that I gave to Ms McNeill. The Government is looking to work with all parties across the Parliament, where we can, to ensure that we can deliver a budget that delivers the priorities not just of the Government but of the Parliament.
That includes moving further upstream into more preventative activity, which was a key tenet of yesterday’s statement by the First Minister on the programme for government and of the document itself. All the areas that Ms Chapman has set out are areas that should be discussed at budget time.
There was a lot of rhetoric about prevention, but I could not see much evidence of an action plan for delivery. However, as you said, perhaps that will emerge as part of the budget discussions that we will have in the coming weeks.
I have a quick question on shorter sentences, which relates to the consultation that is under way at the moment. In your view, how do we make a prison sentence genuinely more meaningful for the offender and for any victims of their crimes?
I would like to return to Ms Chapman’s first point. I say with respect to Ms Chapman that investment in housing, investment in the Scottish child payment and investment in mental health services are all preventative activities that are central tenets of the programme for government that we set out yesterday.
We make prison sentences more meaningful by giving our phenomenal Scottish Prison Service staff the space to provide programme work for prisoners to prevent reoffending. At the moment, our Prison Service staff face a challenge of overcrowding at such a level that they are limited in what they can do by way of programme work. As a result, the incentives and support for prisoners to go through such programmes and to progress in that regard are limited.
That is a critical element of why penal reform is required, alongside the work that I am seeking to do to expand the prison capacity, which includes the provision of the two new prisons, as well as the other work that is under consideration.
I have two final questions, the first of which is about deaths in custody. There were 64 deaths in custody in 2024, including 17 suicides. Although people on remand make up around 26 per cent of the prison population, they account for 46 per cent of suicides. That disparity is stark. How many of those deaths in custody do you believe are preventable?
Those deaths are subject to inquiry and investigation, so it would not be appropriate for me to comment on that.
However, I can comment on the work that has been done by the Prison Service through programmes such as talk to me and the work to improve the prison estate to ensure that it is harder for people to take their own lives. I have seen evidence of that in our newer as well as our older facilities in the work to remove ligature points and the work on other safety features. That work is under way, and the new prisons will have much better facilities that will enable them to respond to the challenges that Ms Chapman has set out.
My final question is about compliance with human rights in our prison system. We have heard in previous evidence sessions that our prison system is not complying with human rights standards. When will compliance with human rights standards become non-negotiable rather than aspirational?
That is a key reason why we need to address the fact that the prison population is currently unsustainable. It is unsustainable for the human rights reasons that Ms Chapman set out, but it is also unsustainable because it affects our ability to do programme work. In addition to the punishment element of prison and the need to protect community safety, one of the principal reasons for incarcerating individuals is to address their behaviour and reduce their reoffending.
We must ensure that we address the prison population. That is a top priority, which is why we ran the consultation over the summer. One of the Government’s first actions was to take the issue of the prison population very seriously.
I will continue on the subject of prisons. In June, you made a statement to Parliament in which you said that you had instructed the Scottish Prison Service to produce a plan to look at all options to maximise the accommodation that is available in the existing estate. You also talked about delivering additional capacity by considering the use of temporary modular accommodation.
I have some simple questions. You made that statement nine or 10 weeks ago. Have the business cases that you expected to receive “soon” when you made the statement in June been received? On what date were they received? What did they recommend? How many additional places can temporary modular accommodation provide, where and at what cost?
I appreciate Mr Kerr’s questions, deputy convener. It is a work in progress, and I cannot provide as fulsome an update to the committee today as he would like. However, I can tell him that that work is very active, and I expect to be able to make announcements on its progress in relation to modular accommodation very soon.
09:30
You used the word “soon” in June, and you have used it again now. What timeframes are we talking about?
I understand Mr Kerr’s questions. He will need to be patient—
I am not good at that.
Well, I am sure that we will be able to work together constructively so that our shared endeavours for the Scottish justice system can be delivered. I give Mr Kerr a guarantee that that work has been a top priority over the summer, not only for Government, where that work is led by Ms Dalrymple, but also for the Prison Service. That work is extensive and ongoing, and I expect to be able to come forward with details very soon.
Next month?
Very soon.
Okay, I will not get an answer on that. I wonder what happened when you asked the SPS to do that work, though. I am getting the impression that it has not given you anything yet—am I right in saying that it has not given you any business cases?
With respect, I have given an answer, deputy convener. It might not be the answer that Mr Kerr wants to hear, but I have given him one. Yes, the SPS has come forward with significant work in that space, but it would be inappropriate for me to provide detail on it until decisions are taken.
All right. I will temporarily let that one go—
Linda Pollock and her team have done significant work in that space and, as I said, I expect to be able to provide details to the committee and Parliament soon.
I look forward to receiving that information.
The UK Government and the Home Secretary have made it clear that they are exploring at pace the avenue of removing foreign-born prisoners from the prison estate. What discussions have you had with the Home Office and the Home Secretary about those matters? What can you report to the committee on progress towards that end?
Obviously, the deportation of individuals from the United Kingdom is a matter for the Home Office; it is not one over which we have control.
Have you discussed it with—
However, I know that that work is ongoing, and I am hoping to be able to meet Home Office ministers soon in order to discuss that and other issues in which we have a shared interest.
Have you not yet met Home Office ministers?
No.
Have you requested such a meeting?
Of course.
Okay. I appreciate that.
I move to policing. A discussion of many aspects of policing would probably detain you for many hours, but I appreciate and honour the fact that you are attending a memorial event in connection with our police service, which is very important. The deputy convener reflected that in his earlier comments to you.
His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary in Scotland issued a report dated 26 May 2026, which is entitled “HMICS assurance review of conduct and discipline”. That report is significant: it contains very disturbing information from the inspectorate about the weaknesses in the way that misconduct and discipline are being handled, especially among the most senior officers. The report issued 24 specific recommendations. Have you discussed that report with Police Scotland?
Yes.
What was the nature of that discussion?
It is important to put into context what was in the report from His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary in Scotland earlier this year, as it also described the strong relationships in the executive team and the strong leadership that the leadership team in Police Scotland has provided.
Yes, I discussed that report with the chief constable and with the Scottish Police Authority, which I intend to meet again in the coming weeks to go into more detail about it. As I said at the Association of Scottish Police Superintendents conference earlier this year, the confidence of the public is critical in the delivery of and the consent around policing. Therefore, we need to ensure that we are delivering a system that has full public confidence; I want to be assured that the processes are sufficiently robust.
That is primarily a matter for the SPA—the chief constable is accountable to the SPA, and the SPA is accountable to me. I am pursuing the matter with the vigour that Mr Kerr would expect.
Did you say that you had met with the SPA to discuss the report?
Yes.
Are you happy with the rigour with which the SPA approaches its responsibilities in relation to the accountability levels that it needs?
Of course. I have full confidence in the SPA, its board, its chair and its leadership.
That is not quite the question that I was asking. I would expect you to have confidence in them, but are you satisfied with the level of rigour?
Yes, although that is not something that I would take for granted or rest on my laurels on, which is why I am having a further discussion with them to discuss this and other matters around policing to ensure that they are scrutinising the actions of Police Scotland with the necessary rigour so that it is held suitably to account on the matters that it is accountable for. I will continue in that vein, to ensure that we are getting a system that has the necessary rigour that Mr Kerr is asking for.
Does it not concern and surprise you that the report, which is critical—I hope that you agree that it is critical in the context of the subject matter but also in its tone—has not yet been discussed at the most senior levels in the SPA?
I believe that it has, but—
Not at the board level—the senior level.
I welcome the report and the reflections that it contains. I am seeking to take forward with the SPA an assurance that it is taking the necessary action to hold Police Scotland to account in the way that the statutory responsibility sets out. I am going to have a further such meeting with the chair of the SPA in due course, but I have also raised those matters directly with the chief constable and the deputy chief constables who were present at that meeting.
Okay. I will follow up on that on another occasion.
You have met representatives—I know that you mentioned this—of the federation, and you have also met ASPS. In relation to the recent material that has appeared in the news about available police officers for the front line, what did the federation and ASPS tell you about the situation in respect of safe staffing levels for shifts for front-line officers and the availability of officers to take their place on the front line?
There was nothing different in what we discussed with either the federation or ASPS from what has been covered in the public domain. As I said, I have raised the matter directly with the relevant deputy chief constable and they are very much seized of that issue, recognising that the number of officers on modification is a significant challenge for the service, and it is one that they are seeking to address.
Again, I will be looking at that area and probing further, because we need to ensure that we are supporting police officers through what are incredibly challenging and often traumatic experiences. We need to ensure that we value and support them, of course, and give them the support that they need to be able to return to front-line duties should that be appropriate. I know that the Police Scotland executive is very seized of that issue and is looking to take action on it.
So—
We are quite tight for time, Mr Kerr. I will bring you back in if I have time at the end, but I want to be fair to all colleagues.
Absolutely. Thank you.
Marie McNair is next.
Good morning. During our recent visit to HMP Low Moss, we were advised that the prison population includes quite a lot of remand prisoners. As you are aware, the increase in their numbers is having a significant impact on overcrowding across the prison estate. What is the Scottish Government doing to expedite such court cases? What is the Scottish Government going to do to tackle the backlog in solemn courts?
We have a very good story to tell on summary case management, and I want to see what can be done to similarly bring down the High Court backlog. In summary case management, we have seen a shift in the use of evidence sharing and technology. The issues that we are facing in the High Court can be partly addressed by that, but the reason is the substantial business that is coming through. It is the success of the Crown and the police in investigating and prosecuting cases that is driving the High Court business being so high.
I have met the Lord President and the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service to discuss that and we are looking at the proposals that have come through from both on how we can move forward. It is critical for victims and communities that court business and the wheels of justice move as quickly as possible, and we will seek to support both in that endeavour.
Why do we have so many remand prisoners in our prison estate? I know that it is not just to do with the backlog in court cases.
That issue is regularly considered in the meetings that I have on a whole-system basis with justice partners, with a particular focus on how we can try to avoid short-term remand.
Clearly, decisions on remand and bail are for the courts to take. They take decisions on a risk basis, following the procedures that they need to follow.
Obviously, I am keen to ensure that we are able to address the remand population in prison. In many cases, that may well mean that someone transfers from being a remand prisoner to becoming a sentence prisoner. However, providing certainty for perpetrators and victims is absolutely critical. I recognise that. For the continued sustainability of the prison system, we need to ensure that we address court business more quickly. We are working with the Scottish Courts and Tribunal Service and the Lord President of the judiciary on that issue.
Thank you. In the interests of time, I will leave it there.
Good morning, cabinet secretary. I want to take you back to the two prisons that are due to open. What is the expected timescale for their opening and running at full capacity? What is the date for HMP Glasgow and the other new prison?
I will bring in Ms Dalrymple to confirm the date for HMP Glasgow. HMP Highland will open at the start of next year. I visited HMP Highland over the summer because there have been delays in construction. It was important for me to meet the builder and to push as hard as I could to ensure that that facility opens as quickly as possible.
I was pleased to be able to go along to one of the important milestone events at HMP Glasgow, which involved the riser installation. I am confident that the progress on HMP Glasgow is strong. I am pleased with the progress there, but I continue to push for HMP Highland to open as quickly as possible.
The expected date for HMP Glasgow will be in 2028, with an additional 357 places.
If the Scottish Government is relying on early prison release and community-based solutions, what is your five-year projection of prison capacity? What will it look like in five years?
That will largely depend on the work that is being done on increasing capacity through the use of modular accommodation or further house blocks. As I said extensively in response to Mr Kerr, those items are under consideration at present. We know that the business that is coming through the High Court, particularly on solemn cases, will drive a significant demand for prison places. We are looking to ensure that we are doing what we can to increase the capacity that is available.
We have also consulted on potential penal reform, but no decisions have been taken on that as yet. When decisions are taken, discussions will be had with this committee and the wider Parliament about how we take those steps forward.
My next question has been touched on slightly. I had a meeting with UpSide, and I was genuinely surprised when I was told that, upon release, a prisoner could literally be given a sleeping bag and told that no accommodation would be made available and they would be put out on the streets. That really shocked me. In terms of short-term prisoners who are released with no licence, supervision or possibility of recall at 30 per cent of their sentence, what assessment has the Government made of the risk that that poses to those released and to the public?
Those were considerations that were taken forward as part of the legislation that introduced the release of short-term prisoners at 30 per cent of their sentence. There is information available on reoffending rates that have come from those processes.
09:45
Ms Bland’s central point, about ensuring that suitable throughcare support is in place so that people are properly supported upon release, is the point—I say this in response to the deputy convener—that I am keen to explore. We need to provide the social policy support, not just to prevent reoffending—that is critical—but to ensure that, when people are released from prison, regardless of whether it was a short-term or long-term sentence, we have the necessary support in place to ensure that behaviours have been addressed and that reoffending potential is reduced.
The whole system is part of that process. Housing is absolutely critical not only in that, but in reducing offending happening in the first place—never mind reoffending. The social drivers that help to breed criminality are poor housing and poor social infrastructure, and those are the areas that I and the Government are determined to address and which are central to the First Minister’s programme for government, not just for the coming year but over the coming five years. We need to make our communities stronger and ensure that those issues are addressed.
What proportion of those released under the early release measure engage with voluntary throughcare? Do you know the percentages?
I do not have the figure in front of me, but I am sure that I can provide that to the committee. Some of that engagement will be mandated, depending on prisoners’ circumstances, and other aspects will be voluntary. I am happy to provide further detail to the committee.
Thank you.
We are delighted to welcome Mr Merrick, who is a guest at the committee today. Mr Merrick, you have questions for the cabinet secretary, so I will hand over to you.
Thank you, and good morning. Cabinet secretary, it is welcome to hear about the significant reduction in crime that you mentioned at the start of the meeting, but residents of Glasgow Anniesland and Drumchapel keep asking me what you can do further and faster, because they want to see how we can keep the momentum up.
I recognise the ambition—which I and the Government certainly hold—to reduce criminality. I said at the outset that, overall, recorded crime is down on 1991 levels. However, over the past year, we have seen an increase, which is concerning to me. That increase has been driven in particular by sexual offences, retail crime and other factors that will be of deep concern to communities. We want to drive hard at those issues, which is why addressing violence against women and girls was, I think, the number 1 commitment that came through from the First Minister’s programme for government yesterday. It is a commitment on which I have been interacting with him and stakeholders, including victims’ families, over the summer.
What we are seeing in terms of social trends and rising levels of misogyny and antisocial behaviour, ultimately driven by violence against women and girls, is of deep concern. This is a malignant malevolence in our society that we must address. That is the determination of this Government, and we will absolutely put forward every possible solution to address that.
We are now seeing different types of crime becoming more prevalent. We heard about youth violence and knife crime in Parliament recently, and about the no knives, better lives campaign. What groups are you going to work with, and what level of funding will be required to get these things under control?
YouthLink Scotland’s work in this space and on the no knives, better lives campaign has been phenomenal. We have a very good story to tell about the work of the violence reduction unit and violence reduction in Scotland over many years. Only through that upstream work will we address these issues.
Although the overall trend is a significant reduction in youth violence and knife crime—and, indeed, hospitalisation due to bladed weapons—we have seen some tragic and high-profile cases over the past year. I, along with the First Minister, met Kayden Moy’s family over the summer and heard the very powerful points that they made about what they believe are the drivers. We will take some of those points very seriously to ensure that we can go upstream and take a much more preventative approach, and that work will include the capacity of justice social work as well as organisations such as YouthLink Scotland, which delivers the no knives, better lives initiative.
Thank you, cabinet secretary. I see that we still have a little bit of time; I do want to be respectful of your time, but I know that one or two colleagues want to come in.
I have a couple of quick wash-up questions. I know that you are leading the debate on the sentencing and penal policy commission's reforms. I appreciate that a consultation on that has been ongoing—indeed, it has just closed—but I would like confirmation that, if the Government were to bring forward any legislative changes, they would come via primary legislation, not a Scottish statutory instrument. Is that right?
Depending on the measures that were chosen, yes.
Okay.
Declaring an interest as the constituency MSP for HMP Barlinnie, can I be absolutely clear that when HMP Glasgow becomes operational, HMP Barlinnie will close for good?
That is the current intention.
Okay.
I have one more question before I pass over to colleagues. As someone who is particularly new to this brief, I have been struck by the capacity issues that exist across the prison estate. However, one area that is not at capacity is the open estate at HMP Castle Huntly. Why are we not using the open estate more, particularly for prisoners who might be a bit older or who are less likely to be of risk?
Such considerations are for individual governors and the referral pathways on to Castle Huntly. I have to say that Castle Huntly’s work is there for all to see with regard to the much lower levels of reoffending and the largely very positive outcomes for the prisoners who go through it. Maximising that capacity and the throughput through Castle Huntly is an area that I am exploring with Linda Pollock, and we are looking at what we can do in that space.
Okay. Two colleagues—sorry, three colleagues—have sought to catch my eye. I suggest that we try to get this session done in the next five or six minutes, to ensure that we are respectful of time.
I have a quick supplementary. We all recognise the issues with blade-related crime; indeed, I asked the First Minister yesterday about no knives, better lives and the fact that it has had a 31 per cent funding cut in the current financial year. You might shake your head, cabinet secretary, but that is the reality. The funding that YouthLink Scotland received fell from £447,000 in 2025-26 to £302,940 this year, and that money was being used for specific purposes in areas of high violence and incidents involving the use of knives in crime, particularly among young people. That money disappeared; therefore, it was a cut.
Let me clarify, deputy convener. The core funding for YouthLink Scotland has gone up. The additional resource that Mr Kerr is referring to—that is, the £150,000 that came through education investment—was for a pilot. Obviously, we are considering the impact of that pilot, but it is not accurate to say that no knives, better lives has been cut, because core funding to YouthLink Scotland, which delivers the initiative, has increased.
Pauline McNeill, you wanted to ask a question, too.
Yes. It is on knife crime, again, and I thank Colm Merrick for raising the matter. I do not need a full answer to my question today, but I do not think the Government has been clear on this at all. I totally accept that knife crime had been reducing—the approach had been a success, if you like—but there have been early indications that it is on the rise again.
Therefore, I ask on behalf of the committee whether the Government can give us specific detail on and recent figures for knife crime. I listened carefully to the exchange on this yesterday, and I did not think the First Minister got it right, if I may say so—I think that the recent trend has been upwards. However, I am asking only for clarity on the matter, because we all want to be clear about what we are dealing with.
All of this detail is in the recorded crime statistics that are published, which I am happy to furnish the committee with.
I have another quick question related to this issue and what Colm Merrick said about Glasgow Anniesland. In Sauchiehall Street in Glasgow, we have 17-year-olds using these weapons. There is the separate issue of retail crime and the fact that it is not being prosecuted, but we also have an issue with 16 and 17-year-olds using these weapons and not being prosecuted for doing so.
Again, I am just laying a marker for this. The First Minister has had two summits on youth crime. I understood that he was saying that the representations that he was getting from communities, parents and young people were that we will have to review the youth crime sentencing policy. I am not looking for detail at this stage.
Sentencing decisions are for the courts, clearly, and all sentences are available to the courts, regardless of age. However, I understand the points that Pauline McNeill is making. They are similar to the points that have been made to me by victims’ families, and those areas are under review.
I am sorry, but it is not for the courts.
It is for the courts.
A public policy decision has been taken by agencies that they are going to the children’s panel at 17 years old. I know that that is the case.
I am happy to provide the committee with more detail around the process and how it works, to ensure that there is the fullest understanding of how we deal with young people through the justice system, including through the use of the children’s panel and other possible options. However, in all of the cases that we have been talking about, all sentences are available to the courts, regardless of age. I am happy to provide the committee with further detail.
We look forward to receiving that clarity. Ms McNeill is a very experienced parliamentarian who I know will be pursuing this issue when you appear before the committee in autumn.
The final question is from Ms Chapman.
Thank you very much. Cabinet secretary, I will take you back to the questions on the prison estate. I would be interested to know—again, maybe this is not for now—about the Government’s analysis of and the projections regarding the balance between the outcomes from the two prisons that are being constructed in Glasgow and Highland and the outcomes from the Bella and Lilias centres. They involve very different types of incarceration and representations of punishment. I would be interested in seeing a much more detailed analysis of outcomes for staff, perpetrators and victims.
There has been very early consideration of the outcomes from the Lilias and Bella centres, but the indications of their effectiveness are very positive.
In the open estate, the effectiveness of Castle Huntly is there for all to see in the reduced reoffending rate. I would be more than happy to have further discussion on that with the committee in due course.
I am grateful, cabinet secretary. I know that you have to get to Tulliallan for an event, so please pass on our best wishes and thanks. We thank you for your attendance and look forward to a fuller session with you in the autumn.
Indeed—I am up for that.
Thank you. I will suspend the meeting for a couple of minutes to allow the witnesses to leave and the next witnesses to come in.
09:57
Meeting suspended.
10:02
On resuming—
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