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Welcome back. Our next item of business is an evidence session on victims’ perspectives across the justice system. We have an excellent panel in front of us: Dr Marsha Scott, from Scottish Women’s Aid; Carol Eden, head of communications and external affairs at Victim Support Scotland, who is also speaking for the victims organisations collaboration forum Scotland; and Jimmy Paul, head of the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit.
We are grateful for your attendance this morning. I will hand over to my colleague Ms Bland to kick us off with questions.
Good morning—it is still the morning; I just checked. Thank you for being with us today.
I will start with Dr Marsha Scott. Scottish Women’s Aid warns that removing section 23D of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995 would increase harm. Do you agree that the proposal fundamentally misunderstands the nature of domestic abuse and violent offending against women and girls and that it would make victims less safe?
Can you remind me what that section says? I have not had time to pull up my notes.
It concerns bail.
It is to do with the presumptions against someone being bailed.
My concern is that even when the bail provisions are carried out robustly and with the best professionalism in the world, women and children are still not safe—there has been ample evidence about that in the news over the past few months.
There are two reasons for my concern. First, the system does not work in the way that it was designed to; and, secondly, the assessment of risk is really poor, as you suggest. It is not always poor, but it is not consistently good. Even though this country is held up as a paragon with regard to the criminalisation of coercive control, we still have a system that equates separation with safety and that equates serious harm with physical violence.
There are many ways in which the system could be better. I absolutely understand the pressures on the prisons, and I am not a fan of banging up a lot of folk in jail. However, the issue is that we should focus all of our decision making on the safety of victims or complainers first.
Yes. I asked about domestic violence in particular because of the complexities and nuances of the issue, as well as the levels of manipulation involved. Is it possible for a court to have all the information that it needs in order to make that decision and then grant someone bail so they can return to the community—or even to the address where the victim lives?
Oh, yes, the stories we could tell you. We must have a system for deciding who is held in custody and who is bailed—human rights law requires that. From what I can gather, our Crown Office colleagues routinely oppose bail and routinely lose that argument.
The problem cannot be fixed so much by changing the processes as by raising the threshold for risk, so that whoever makes the decision to grant bail in the context of domestic abuse can clearly demonstrate how women and children will be kept safe. At the moment, that is clearly not happening.
Jimmy Paul, I read with interest the SVRU’s state of the nation report 2026. Is that what it is called?
Yes, that report is called “Unfinished Business”.
I saw it with a different front cover than the one I have before me, but I believe that that is its title. Will you talk me through the definition of a public health approach to violence and explain to me what that means?
First, good morning; I am delighted to be here.
The public health approach has been spoken about a lot since the pandemic. When it is applied to violence, there are four parts to it. The first involves understanding the data. That data can be from Police Scotland or the Scottish Government, but it can also be qualitative data that concerns what communities, victims of violence and so on are telling us.
The second part involves understanding the root causes of violence. In Scotland today, they are the same as they were 21 years ago, when we were founded: poverty, growing up around hardship, adverse childhood experiences, a lack of role models, absent parents and so on.
The third part involves testing and innovating new ways to deliver change. Of course, things that are at the cutting edge of innovation often do not work, and you have to be honest about that and accept and understand failure in order to learn from it, build on it and do something different. However, given the financial pressures that we face today, failure can be particularly challenging for partners when they are innovating.
The last part involves scaling up the things that work and making them available to as many young people and communities across Scotland as possible. That, in a nutshell, is the public health approach to violence.
In your report, you liken violence to a disease that creeps through communities and almost acts like a contagious virus. I was trying to link that with domestic abuse, which is a very hidden, behind-the-doors issue. It can occur across a range of classes, including middle class and working class. However, I could find only one piece of data relating to domestic abuse, on page 11. It shows that there was a steep rise when the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018 came in, which is a different conversation.
Given that you liken violence to a disease, and that domestic abuse is often hidden behind closed doors, which is one reason why it is difficult to tackle, I am trying to understand how that fits with the public health definition of violence.
There are a few parts to my answer. First, we are funded through the community safety budget, and lots of domestic violence falls under the equally safe remit. There are partners on this panel who are slightly better placed to answer why domestic abuse does not feature more prominently in this report, but domestic abuse is of great concern to us. The profile of violence is evolving, because that is what happens.
And escalating.
Absolutely. At a rate—
It fits in with violence reduction.
Yes. The issue is of deep concern to us. Lots of the root causes are the same: intergenerational cycles of trauma and the norms that people see as they grow up. They see domestic violence and violence against women and girls as normal, and those behaviours are perpetuated and repeated for generations.
Again, poverty is relevant. Not everybody who grows up in poverty gets involved in violence—in fact, the vast majority do not—but there is a link between growing up in hardship and a greater prevalence of violence, especially when you look at Scottish index of multiple deprivation data.
A lot of this is about norm-setting and about examples. We live in a time when manosphere messaging is creeping into young men’s minds through social media. We live in a time when lots of that is being normalised and promoted, and I am deeply concerned about those things when it comes to domestic violence.
It is interesting that you talked about data. That links me to my next question, which is for Carol Eden. Victim Support Scotland’s submission to the sentencing and penal policy commission’s call for evidence is really interesting. It is from May 2025, but it was shared with the committee. It says that only 29 per cent of victims report violent crime. Does that skew our understanding of what is happening with crime in our communities?
Like colleagues on the panel, we are here to support victims. It seems to be a really small number of people who report such crimes, which means that support is not available to those who do not report them. In terms of how those crimes are recorded and how we are able to address the issues and understand people’s needs, that becomes really challenging.
Is the justice system currently too focused on the rights and needs of offenders at the expense of victims?
Speaking on behalf of VOCFS, there is definitely a perception that that is the case. We look at the intended purpose of some of the legislation and fully endorse the prospect of achieving a sustainable prison population, but where do victims come into that agenda? What confidence and trust are they given that, if they report something, they will be believed and supported all through that process?
We are trying to understand where the focus on victims is and ensure that their needs are balanced with other considerations in a well-run, holistic and safe society. Where do victims sit in that agenda? We hear that question quite a lot from our members and also—
You used the term “perception”. In your experience, how much of that is perception and how much is reality when it comes to serving the minority of victims who come forward and go through the system?
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The reality is that only 29 per cent of victims report crimes, and an even smaller percentage will go through the process and receive support. We report what victims tell us about their perceptions, their realities and how the system has impacted them.
The criminal justice system exists to find out who is responsible for committing crimes and taking offenders through the process, but much work has also been done through the victims task force, which takes a victim-centred approach.
It is important to have such initiatives so that victims know where to access information and what support is available at any given point. As a victim moves through the process, they might go from the police to COPFS and then to the SCTS and the Parole Board for Scotland. They may be called different things during that process. It is really important that information, support and knowledge of their rights are available and accessible.
Ms Bland, I will bring you in briefly to ask a final wee question, because I must bring in other members.
When people are going through all those processes, there is a real risk of communication breakdown. Your submission says that victims wait seven to 10 days for letters about community orders. How is that trauma informed? What does that do to a victim?
I would agree with you entirely. I understand that letters may still be necessary, despite today’s modern ways of communicating. However, it is important to keep victims informed about what is happening. In addition, the terminology is often not accessible. When people read a citation letter, for example, they need to understand what it means, but it can be really complicated. Initiatives such as the task force and the justice digital front door are seeking to simplify the language and break things down for people. Organisations such VOCFS and Victim Support Scotland can sit alongside people and say, “This is what it means”. The person may be going through it for the first time, but we have experience because we have been through it with other victims. We know what to expect, we know what document means, and we can help the person to understand what it means for them and what the next steps might be.
Okay. Thank you.
I will bring in Mr Kerr next. If we all stick to seven or eight minutes, I should be able to get everybody in.
As not all of you heard the evidence from the first panel, I note that we heard from witnesses from Social Work Scotland, COSLA, Community Justice Scotland and the Scottish Sentencing Council. My conclusion from listening to their evidence is that the system is disjointed, fragmented, patchy and variable in how it works. Sometimes organisations work together and sometimes they do not. It all depends on the people on the ground, apparently.
How do victims perceive their experience in the justice system, particularly in relation to their confidence in community-based criminal justice?
On your point about the system being disjointed and variable, we hear the same thing from those who have been victims of violence, as well as from charities, youth workers, medics, teachers and others. However, we also see fantastic examples of brilliant collective practice and data sharing where that is appropriate.
Does the good practice depend on geography? Will you name somewhere that works really well, please?
We have seen brilliant work in Glasgow city centre with the street guardians initiative that we helped to set up. It includes multiple charities, the councils and Police Scotland, and we share information in ways that enable young people to feel welcome and to act safely in the city centre. That has happened in the absence of egos and competition. It can sometimes be quite hard when different organisations, council areas or charities are fighting for resource or work, but we have seen an absence of that and a real focus on purpose.
They see each other as rivals, do they?
That happens sometimes. It is more about access to funding. It will be interesting to hear the reflections of others on the panel, but when charities are fighting for finite pots of money, there is often a bit of competition.
That is a proactive violence reduction initiative. What about community justice? Do you have good examples of places where that is really working? Please share.
I can only speak for the Violence Reduction Unit, I am afraid, and not across community justice activity.
Perhaps I will ask Carol Eden or Marsha Scott to comment, then. You did not hear the evidence from the first panel. It was deeply worrying, particularly in light of the Government’s intention to proceed with early release, the presumption against short sentences and so forth. How do victims perceive the landscape when it comes to how joined up or not joined up everything is? Confidence levels would have to be pretty high for a victim to feel secure if someone who has perpetrated an offence against them were released back into the community where they live.
That is a daunting prospect. That leads us into questions about safety planning and risk assessment. There are definitely concerns about that, and there has been an erosion of trust and confidence in the system.
An erosion?
Yes.
And it was not high to start with.
Victims tell us about court delays and the trauma of putting their lives on hold while going through the court process. Statistics may suggest that things are moving on a certain trajectory but, when you consider matters at a human level, people are concerned about the impact on their lives, including their relationships, work and family, until they have the chance to bring that process to a conclusion.
Some victims tell us that they wish that they had not bothered because the process has taken so long. It is important that support is in place so that people understand the process and have their position explained to them, enabling them to be supported throughout. That is what makes the crucial difference to people.
It definitely feels like a disjointed system in some cases. As I said to Ms Bland, the task force is a crucial part in improving that communication and breaking down those barriers to make that information much more accessible.
What are those barriers, and what are those silos that organisations are operating in? Why do they exist after all this time? We have been talking about this forever in Scotland. Why have we still got those?
Sometimes it is to do with language. For example, in some legislation a person is a victim, but in other legislation they are a complainer.
Oh, you mean the barriers that victims perceive exist?
Absolutely.
Okay, but there also seem to be barriers or walls that stop organisations on the ground from working together as effectively as they might. Is that your experience, or is it anecdotal?
I definitely see a willingness to make things work better. Speaking from a Victim Support Scotland perspective, we meet regularly with our partners and criminal justice agencies, and there is a collective desire to make things better. We recognise from early conversations with the SCTS, for example, that increasing the number of High Court sittings available could help. We would welcome those efforts, but we want to see evidence that they are making a discernible difference, that more victims are being supported and that the system is improving. Those things are really important to victims.
We saw the SCTS’s projections for the next five years. It gave us a paper, or it had published a paper—you have probably seen it—and it did not hold out much promise that delays in the delivery of justice will come down. In fact, it seemed to project that they will get worse over the next five years.
Marsha, what are your comments on the disjointed nature of the system, especially in relation to the confidence levels that we all need to have in community justice if the current trajectory of policy continues?
To be honest, it is not a homogeneous thing. Joining the dots across the systems to defeat silo working is not rocket science. Partnership working happens well when people have a shared understanding of the problem.
I will speak from the perspective of violence against women and girls, which is not reflective of some of the analysis that we have heard here, because, as I said, violence is not a homogeneous thing. In the world of domestic abuse, it has been a principle for decades that, if you do not have joined-up working, you increase the risk to victims. There is lots of research out there about what helps people to join up the dots. Around Scotland, multi-agency risk assessment conferences—MARACs—are taking place. They are specifically designed to bring together the critical partners to discuss high-risk cases and respond quickly. In some areas of Scotland, they work very well.
Where do they work really well? Just shout out an example.
No, I am not going to do that. So—
It is helpful to do that; otherwise, we will—
No, it is not. It is not helpful to point out people—
Well, it is to me, because, otherwise, I will not know.
It is not helpful in the sense that there are not good guys and bad guys in this.
No, but, if there is somewhere that is doing it really well—
If I could just finish.
Okay.
It is so obvious when you are working at community level that partnership working is not free; it is a resource. We have multiple waiting lists across Scotland, with people waiting for us to provide support or advice. What is the first thing that goes when you have a waiting list? It is the meeting with somebody else.
It is all well and good to wring our hands and say that people need to get out of their silos. I agree that they should, but how do we make that possible when they are reporting that the demand for their services and the number of people who need their support is going up, but the resources that they have to provide that support are going down?
I completely get where you are coming from, but the reason why I was persistent about finding out where it is working well is that I want to celebrate that, learn from it and transplant those lessons to other places so that we level up across Scotland through a joined-up approach.
One of the lessons will relate to those advocacy services that are well funded. My experience is that, where organisations have been working together well, additional funding is going in. Advocacy is the glue that stitches together the different elements of an organisation. Say that you have a women’s aid support worker with a client in front of her who does not understand what will happen in court, needs a lawyer or is worried about her children. I will finish up, I promise, convener. It is a completely unreasonable expectation to assume that she can understand how all those things work.
Sure.
It is also a completely unreasonable expectation that all those people will want to deal with her or that they should deal with her—because she wants to tell her story once, right?
Without an advocate acting on behalf of a victim, the victim is left dealing with multiple agencies that do not necessarily connect well and do not speak to one another.
Bingo.
That is a distressing picture, is not it? The fact that advocacy is not available as an equal access service for every victim.
That is why we need to get rid of the postcode lottery on services in Scotland.
That is exactly why I want to find out what the best practice is.
Thank you, Mr Kerr. I will bring in Colm Merrick.
Good late morning, panel.
I will direct this question to Carol Eden. When I was last at the committee, I raised concerns about knife crime in my constituency of Glasgow Anniesland, including in Drumchapel. Victim Support Scotland has been vocal in recent days and weeks on how young people become involved in knife crime. What might a review look like, and when might that work start?
Yes, we have been vocal about that. We have supported families who have been dealing with the most tragic losses: the loss of a family member. We made a video, which I think we shared with members last week. That also related to the knife angel sculpture that was on display in Leith.
We talked to lots of people who have been impacted by knife crime, and they are united in wanting to do something so that no one ever experiences such losses again. It is crucial that we understand the root causes of people carrying knives. Do they do it out of fear that other people are carrying them? We are interested in understanding those factors so that we can find evidence-based solutions.
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Lots of things can raise the profile of the issue, such as the knife angel sculpture, which is so imposing and evocative. I think that it has been really emotional for people to visit it. That is a great starting point for a conversation that challenges attitudes about carrying a knife. Do people carry knives because they are fearful? Do people do it to show masculinity and bravado in their local community?
We hear from victims’ families that they are experts in their own lives, so they know how the issue has impacted their whole family set-up and how they approach things. They are also experts in what would and would not work in their communities. We are interested in speaking to families who have been impacted to learn from them and to hear what they would like to happen. Lived experience is vital to co-designing services.
We are particularly interested in exploring whether changing the lens through which we consider the carrying of knives would make a difference. We could make assumptions that various things would help, but we want there to be an evidence base before any resources are put into campaigns, so that they have the desired effects. As part of that, we would like to explore the possibility of using bleed kits. Would that have the desired effects? If somebody were stabbed or were bleeding for whatever reason, might such kits make the difference in whether they survived while waiting for emergency services to arrive?
Are there any timelines for the review?
We are part way through it. We have just finished the work involving talking to bereaved families about how the issue has impacted them. We speak to people and collect such evidence regularly. It is very much about supporting them in what they want to achieve. They meet and chat together, and we are working through what a response might look like. We would be happy to present our work at a later stage, when it is more formulated.
As the constituency MSP for Leith, Mr Macpherson will have some thoughts on the issue and will want to come in. However, before I bring him in, I will afford Mr Paul the opportunity to add to Mr Merrick’s point about knife crime and young people.
I will add a few things. Over the past 20 years, knife crime has come down significantly in Scotland, and young people have led the way in that. We live in a time when social media can amplify incidences; in the public eye, a viral video can outweigh 1,000 effective interventions. The vast majority of young people never get involved in violence, but we know that, when they do, it has the most devastating consequences. I, too, have spoken to lots of people who have lost children to violence, and it is heartbreaking—they experience unimaginable pain.
We need to do more to get to grips with the issue. We support limiting and restricting the sale of knives. However, even if we do that, there are more than 10 million knives in kitchens all over Scotland, so the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit accepts that, if someone is so minded, they could use a knife that they had accessed from a kitchen. We need to focus on prevention—stopping people thinking about picking up a knife in the first place. As well as doing all the work that Carol Eden has described, we must continue to double down on prevention.
As the constituency MSP for Leith, Mr Macpherson will want to draw attention to the success of the knife angel project, so I hand over to him.
I thank Carol Eden for the work that Victim Support Scotland has been doing. My constituency office and I have, for some time, been assisting two of the families that have been highlighted. Having the knife angel sculpture in Leith was very powerful and evocative, and it brought together families from all over central Scotland, including at the end of last week.
In spring 2025, I met the Violence Reduction Unit to discuss the rise of these issues. In no way am I associating the unit with what happened but, tragically and unjustly, John McNab was murdered approximately six months later in my constituency. Although knife crime is down from 20 years ago, it is rising now. A growing small minority of our young people are engaging in serious violent activity. As Victim Support Scotland highlighted, the victims of those crimes are dealing with devastating consequences and, understandably, they find it difficult to move past the extreme tragedies in their families’ lives. We need to act collectively to reduce the growing trend. Youth work, education, information and the provision of positive disincentives are all part of prevention work, but the criminal justice system also needs to be robust and provide a deterrent. Is there anything that you would like to say about that, given that we are having the discussion?
There needs to be a deterrent. We need to start with open discussions to make it socially unacceptable to carry knives, and we need to restrict access to them. We need to tackle a lot of the online content and provide positive role models. The “Don’t be that guy” campaign focuses on violence against women and girls; there could be a similar campaign for knife crime. A lot of good work is being done. We need to invest in communities. Jimmy Paul spoke about the depth of poverty that some families are in across Scotland. We need to have open conversations so that people can see that there are alternatives and other paths that they can go down.
As distressing and uncomfortable as it might be to know that the problem exists in our communities, it is helpful to discuss it openly. Let us not be fearful about asking questions about people’s intentions. If a teenager or young person is going out, let us not be fearful about asking them what they come across and how they respond to it. We need to equip them to be the young people and adults who we want them to be.
In recent years, changes to justice legislation have resulted in the incorporation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and our not sending young people to prisons. I stand behind those changes, but an unintended consequence is a perception across Scotland that there is no deterrent and that there are no consequences for young people who get involved in such behaviour. If they commit serious acts of crime or violence, the children’s hearings system becomes involved, the reporter is notified and that process is followed. However, that perception causes problems in society.
In the past year, we and Police Scotland’s youth engagement team have spoken to more than 700 young people across Scotland. Young people have told us consistently that
“they see their friends or peers do bad things solely because they are bored”.
Many have told us that they feel that they or their peers might carry a knife or get involved in violence for a few key reasons. The first is fear, because of what they see on social media and what they hear. For example, they might hear that someone on their street is tooled up or carrying a knife in school, and they might feel that they need to do the same for their safety. That is a challenge, because you are much more likely to be a victim of your own knife or weapon if you carry one.
We are developing a programme to work with young people, as well as children in earlier age groups, including late primary school, to demystify the myth and help them to understand that there is no safe place to be stabbed. Out of the 700 young people whom we spoke to, many would say, “If someone stabs us, their DNA would be on the knife.” We would respond, “There is a strong chance that you might lose your life, which is not a gamble that you want to take.” Education is an important element.
Another reason is fashion. Young people, who might well come from homes where the parents are absent, or who have had adverse childhood experiences or really horrendous things happen to them in their early lives, find belonging and acceptance in peer groups—or adults willing to exploit them—as long as they can carry a knife or get involved in something serious.
I know for a fact that that sort of exploitation is happening. I also know for a fact that the unintended consequence that you mentioned of a perception that there is no deterrent in the criminal justice system—an unintended consequence of very well-intended changes, I should say, the majority of which are having a positive impact—is not a myth. Young people are engaging in very concerning harmful activity, and the criminal justice system is not apprehending or deterring them.
This is a really serious question for us right now, because the more time that passes, the more the trend grows and the more harm it causes. We, as a committee, are determined to do our part to address it—many members are asking about it in the chamber, too—but having your assistance in making things better will be pivotal.
With unease, I agree with you—and I say, “with unease”, because I would hate Scotland to end up punishing young people for ultimately being exploited by adults. We are hearing of that sort of thing happening more and more in societies across Scotland from different charities, and increasingly from police intelligence. Young people under a certain age are being identified, because they are carrying knives or drugs or are getting involved in violence. We must do something about that.
Our time is limited, but it would be really helpful and interesting for us to hear more about what the Violence Reduction Unit thinks that we could do. If you wanted to put that in correspondence to us, we would receive it gladly.
I think that that would be the best thing to do. We will do that.
Thank you.
We look forward to receiving that correspondence, Mr Paul. I call Maggie Chapman.
Good morning to the witnesses, and thank you very much for your comments so far.
I will start with Jimmy Paul. In its state of the nation report, the violence reduction unit found that, although only 0.9 per cent of the population experienced repeated violent crime, they experienced 61 per cent of all crime. That is an astonishingly concentrated group, and there will, I suppose, be overlapping triggers of deprivation and the rest of the things outlined in your report. In the view of the VRU, what should we be doing? Should we be focusing on that 0.9 per cent in order to prevent repeat victimisation?
You are right to point out that nearly two thirds of all the violence that happens in Scotland is concentrated on nearly 1 per cent of its population. I was listening to the evidence in the previous session and heard some of the issues mentioned—indeed, we have mentioned some of them already—but we are talking about those who are homeless, who are experiencing issues with addiction and who have a long history of adverse childhood experiences and different forms of abuse. We talk a lot about young people—after all, that is the issue that is in our face, and it is, of course, really striking—but most of the serious violence happens to the over-35s or over-45s, and the exit ramps from that way of life become steeper when you have been involved in it for so long. It is a real problem.
My answer, as you would probably expect, is that we continue to invest in all forms of prevention. What you have described is more downstream prevention; no matter whether someone has been involved in violence 101 or 501 times, we still need to act, to make sure that it is the last time. However, I would warn that it is more expensive to provide support around those people than it is to build healthy, happy small children who never even think about violence. We need to do all forms of violence prevention, both upstream and downstream.
Building on that, I wonder whether another issue is what we are measuring and counting and how we are assessing success. In this case, we might be measuring police interventions and recidivism rates, but we are not measuring how many more people we are supporting into proper accommodation and so on. Do we need a shift in thinking in that respect, too?
A hundred per cent—yes. However, I have not worked through my thinking on what, exactly, some of those measures might look like. When I was in a previous role at the Wellbeing Economy Alliance, we often spoke about the need for a basket of measures to ensure that we were moving in the right direction. I think that we need to have a basket of measures for repeat offenders—we certainly need one for repeat victims of violence—to ensure that we are doing the right things and that we can see what progress is being made, year on year.
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You make an important point about the need to take a parallel track of prevention and tackling the current system. That has consequential budget and resourcing implications.
Let me turn to Carol Eden. As part of the work that Victim Support Scotland does with various groups, there is a lot of talk about how we can make our justice system genuinely survivor or victim centred. You spoke about the communication process and about people being informed and having the perception of safety. Will you unpick the distinction between what a survivor-centred or victim-centred justice system should look like, by which I mean what survivors tell you they need, and our focus on things such as custody rates and sentence lengths? There is a mismatch there.
Sure. As I have said a couple of times, lots of people who have been impacted by crime tell us that the language itself is a barrier to understanding. The greatest positive impact comes from referral to support agencies such as Women’s Aid, Victim Support Scotland and many of our members. It is important that a victim has someone alongside them throughout their journey, because the victim’s journey is not a linear one. It might be long or it might be short. It might involve just a light touch or it might be much more intensive, depending on the different processes that they go through.
Victims also need to be given a good explanation of what will happen. If sentencing is part of the process, it can be complicated to understand what might require a custodial sentence and what might require a community sentence. There is a need for information about that, too.
Just as we have talked about the need not to be fearful of having conversations about such matters with young people, let us not be fearful about sharing information with victims. It might not be what they want to hear, but the process should never be worse than what they have gone through in the first place. Having someone alongside them who helps them to understand the process and who can explain things is absolutely crucial to their wellbeing and healing and to enabling a victim to get beyond the impact that the crime has had on their life.
Please push back if this is not a fair assessment, but if we are saying that it is the support structures around the system that are important, it is clear that there are things that, from the victim’s point of view, the criminal justice system is not good at and maybe should not have to be good at, because it should not be doing those things. How do we ensure that we do not see the outcome of a criminal justice process as being the only form of justice when, in fact, what matters is all the softer, more human stuff that you have described and, ultimately, the harm reduction that comes from that?
All of those things matter. Feeling that justice has been served is also a matter of being respected as a human and feeling that your rights as a victim have been respected. Many victims also want sufficient support to be provided for perpetrators. We need to have a balanced society into which people can reintegrate and be part of a community.
Members across the board—I include us in this, as well as victims—want there to be fewer victims in the future. If there must be victims, we want them to be provided with adequate support—in fact, we want them to be provided with proper support that helps them through the process.
Thank you. I will turn to Marsha Scott. Following on from that point about wanting there to be fewer victims in the future and the need to take a holistic approach to harm reduction now and in the future, Scottish Women’s Aid has been very clear that community disposals cannot guarantee safety. You said that earlier today, and you have said it previously as well. What do we need to do to ensure that a genuinely survivor-led community disposal is possible, given what we know about not only reoffending rates for people who get custodial sentences but the harm that is done by custodial sentences to the perpetrators and to future victims when they get out?
My first plea would be to look at the evidence. One of my biggest concerns about sentencing at summary level is that there has never been a convincing evidence base that shows that community disposals are either a deterrent or rehabilitative. I am not saying that we should have no community disposals in domestic abuse cases, but I am saying that we should figure out how to use them in a way that does not further endanger women and children and that manages our system.
On the harm reduction part, my feeling is that the system is missing a clear statement on the type of perpetrators or accused who are such a danger to victims or complainers that releasing them just cannot be safe. The same thing is lacking in relation to who should get custodial sentences. The first thing that would really help with harm reduction is clarity on who is too dangerous and on where we do not have the tools to protect women in the short term.
Obviously, everybody will get out of jail at some point, so, when they come out, there needs to be a mechanism that reduces the potential for harm. There are tools out there, and they are used in other jurisdictions. I am happy to hear about the roll-out of GPS, but we could use technology that we have now more effectively and invest in it so that it is readily available across all postcodes. We need intensive supervision by criminal justice social work, although we know that there is an investment issue around that.
If you put the safety of women and children first, you will reorganise where the ducks sit in the system. The first and most critical thing is to be clear about when releasing someone is just not safe. Then we need a commitment to not releasing anybody early or on bail when there is no availability of protective things such as tagging and monitoring. It is then about responding to breaches. It is about making the system do what it says on the tin—it is not rocket science.
We need to be clear that there is a difference between what we want to work and what does work. Frankly, community disposals are in place because the biggest area of work for police and courts in Scotland is domestic abuse—it is something like 25 to 30 per cent of their work. You cannot find anything else that they do more often and that requires more of their resources. If we saw any kind of investment in responding to domestic abuse that correlated to the sheer numbers and the burden that it places on the system, we would probably be a little bit better at this. It is important that we set up the system around that rather than around other forms of crime that are less likely to occur or to have such a high rate of recidivism.
The final thing that I would say is that domestic abuse and sexual assault—crimes of violence against women and girls—cannot be lumped in with other forms of violence. What actually acts as a deterrent and as a rehabilitation mechanism will be very specific to those crimes.
Convener, do I have time for one tiny question?
Yes, if it is very brief.
Dr Scott, on your point about evidence, we heard earlier from Karyn McCluskey that, for people who have community sentences, the reoffending rate is 23 or 24 per cent. For those who get custodial—
I am sorry, but I could not hear. What rate?
For community sentencing, it is roughly 23 or 24 per cent. For custodial sentences, it is 56 per cent.
Are you talking about recidivism rates?
Yes. Are we not stratifying that data well enough to understand which of those are related to domestic abuse?
Exactly.
The evidence that we heard earlier indicates that community sentences are better, but you are saying that there is not the evidence for domestic abuse cases specifically.
I would be interested in seeing the data disaggregated in that way. However, we also need to talk to the survivors and find out what their experiences are, because they have been responsible for their safety for centuries, if you know what I mean. Unfortunately, with community sentences, because we do not have an evidence base that shows which kind of community sentence will increase the likelihood of harm and which kind will reduce it, people throw things at the wall to see what sticks.
Thank you.
I have two final questions. I need to bring the session to a close by noon, but I think that this question should have quite a short answer. Part 1 of the Domestic Abuse (Protection) (Scotland) Act 2021, which relates to domestic abuse protection orders and domestic abuse protection notices, has not yet been implemented. The Scottish Government has to get a move on with that, does it not?
Sorry, but what was the end of that?
The Scottish Government has to get a move on with that, does it not?
I sat in a room that looked a lot like this—if it was not this room—when that bill was being debated. It just would not be true to say that that part of the bill was readily implementable when it was passed. It was too complex, with too many hoops, and it was too expensive a proposition—and I argued that at the time. I know that colleagues in Police Scotland are working hard to find a solution for its implementation, but I think that the conclusion that we are all reaching is that we are trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. The question is how we put emergency barring orders or emergency protection orders—which Scotland is far behind in implementing—on a practical footing. It is not a matter of just getting on with it; it is a matter of figuring out a different solution, because the tools that we have are not going to work.
That was not a one-word answer; it was a nuanced answer, which is what I expected.
A one-word answer is impossible for me.
I appreciate that, Dr Scott, and I appreciate your candour in that respect.
I will finish with a question for Ms Eden. How effective is the victim information and advice service? Does it work for victims? Give me your unvarnished view on the victim information and advice service.
It is under incredible pressure, as a lot of volume is going through it, but victims’ experiences are not homogeneous. How the service operates, and whether it operates, depends on which court you are in. It would be really welcome if, where improvement is needed, that could be resourced and implemented.
It sounds to me like another postcode lottery. Is it?
Yes, I would agree.
I am sure that we will want to take that up as well.
I thank our witnesses for their evidence. I am sure that we could have gone on for many more hours, and the nature of the issue means that we will continue having conversations. The intention behind the evidence sessions that we have had today and in the previous weeks has been to set the scene for those of us who are new to the criminal justice sphere. I have certainly found it helpful.
All of that will culminate in a lengthy evidence session next week with the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and the Minister for Victims and Community Safety. You can take it as read that some of the points that you have made today will find their way into the questioning then.
I thank you for your attendance and for the work that all of you do to support victims and survivors.
That concludes the public part of our meeting. We will now move into private session to consider agenda items 5 and 6.
12:00
Meeting continued in private until 12:19.
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