No, that is fine.

Thanks very much. Pauline McNeill, I will bring you in.

Before I bring in Russell Findlay, I come to Stuart Munro. The Law Society’s submission welcomed the proposed restriction on the commissioner intervening in individual cases. Are there any additional points that you would like to make about that, following the response from Jamie Foulis?

I will ask a final question and then we will move on to look at embedding trauma-informed practice.

We heard concerns from Scottish Women’s Aid that a commissioner post would essentially add an additional layer of bureaucracy into the system. It might limit what it described as fairly positive current access for organisations such as Scottish Women’s Aid to policy makers and justice agencies. Do you have a view about how a victims commissioner might interfere with or change the current process of communication?

A very good morning, and welcome to the 26th meeting in 2023 of the Criminal Justice Committee. We have received no apologies this morning. Pauline McNeill is running a little bit late and will, I hope, join us shortly.

Our first item of business is the continuation of evidence taking on the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill. As a reminder, we are in stage 1 of our scrutiny of the bill, in which we are focusing specifically on taking evidence on parts 1, 2 and 3, which cover the establishment of a victims and witnesses commissioner, the embedding in the justice system of trauma-informed practice and the extension of special measures to civil cases. We expect stage 1 to run until about mid-November, after which we will move on to consider other parts of the bill.

We are joined by a panel of witnesses from organisations that represent the legal profession. I welcome Jamie Foulis of Balfour and Manson, who is a member of the Family Law Association; Stuart Munro, who is convener of the criminal law committee of the Law Society of Scotland; and Jonathan Campbell, who is president of the Edinburgh Bar Association. Welcome, to you all.

I refer members to papers 1 and 2. I intend to allow around 90 minutes for this session. Before we get under way, I ask members to be succinct with their questions and panel members to be succinct with their responses. If we can, let us try to work through parts 1, 2 and 3 in turn in our questions.

I will begin with a question on part 1, which deals with the proposed establishment of a victims and witnesses commissioner. In broad terms, are you supportive of the proposal for a statutory victims and witnesses commissioner and, if so, why? We will begin with Jamie Foulis.

Thank you very much. As we still have a number of members who want to come in, I must ask for fairly succinct responses. I call Fulton MacGregor, to be followed by Katy Clark.

I must ask just one panel remember to respond to that, please. We have a wee bit to get through.

Do members have any other comments?

Thank you very much for those comments, which are all absolutely appropriate. From my perspective, I welcome the observations of HM Inspectorate of Prosecution. This has perhaps been a long time coming. From personal experience, I know about some of the challenges that are faced in relation to the provision of pathology services in local areas. I highlight the fact that the challenges that we face in that regard perhaps extend to other organisations, such as Police Scotland, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and even education bodies, but that is perhaps a bit further down the line in terms of our wider approach.

With regard to the recommendation that is made in our paper, are members happy for us to pursue that approach now and then to revisit the issue?

Members indicated agreement.

I am asking about the criminal justice space. Obviously, I am interested in your comments about children in the civil space, but my question was more about the experience of special measures used in criminal cases.

Our next agenda item is consideration of correspondence from the Scottish Government on access to court transcripts. I refer members to paper 3. Members will recall that we have been writing to the Lord President and the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs with a view to the process for survivors of rape and sexual offences to access court records being reviewed and any charges being eliminated. As part of that, the cabinet secretary agreed to set up a pilot, and the latest update from Angela Constance is set out in this week’s papers.

Before I open up the discussion to members, I want to highlight a couple of points. First, we might wish to check whether the pilot will be retrospective and open to the survivors who first raised the issue with the committee. The clerks could be asked to check that with Scottish Government officials. Secondly, members are asked to note that copies of the cabinet secretary’s letter have been sent to Rape Crisis Scotland, Scottish Women’s Aid and Victim Support Scotland.

I invite members to consider whether any further action is needed at this stage, beyond keeping the Scottish Government’s plans under review and taking the action that I have mentioned already.