Chamber and committees

The issue for us all as parliamentarians is that, if we do not want to find ourselves constantly facing the necessity to make decisions that provide short-term relief, we have to step up to the debate and to the challenge of being prepared to discuss, engage with and work through the longer-term reforms that are needed.

It is fair to say that, for a very long time, along with the rest of the United Kingdom, Scotland has been an outlier in the sense of having a very high prison population per capita, compared with other jurisdictions. I would dispute that it has all been predictable, because there have been changes in recent times. You touched on the complexity, which certainly seems to have increased post-Covid. The remand population is higher than it was pre-Covid. Therefore, some changes were not predictable, and, with regard to the rate of increase, although we have had many periods of a high prison population, it has been stabilised at quite a high level; I am on the record as saying that it is too high. With regard to the recent rate of increase, we have seen the population shooting up by more than 250 in short weeks or short months; we experienced that at some point last year.

We are improving our understanding of the demand that is coming our way. Much work has been done by the criminal justice board. People can gather lots of data, but what we require is data that supports the justice system as a whole.

I reiterate my point that I have never described emergency early release as anything other than providing short-term relief. I have always been entirely candid about that. I have always been candid about the impact of any intervention that has been proposed. There have been several interventions, not all of which were unanimously approved by people around this table. The fact that there is not just one contributory factor—one issue or one problem that drives up our prison population—means that there must be more than one solution. The Government has always been frank, and whether it was home detention curfew regulations, which come in next month, regulations in relation to foreign nationals, regulations around GPS, the investment in community justice, or the work that is being done to increase capacity in our prisons, we have not presented anything in isolation as getting any of us off the hook with regard to the longer-term and more radical reform that is needed.

Will you give way again?

It is fair to raise that point, because I ran out of time in the chamber and did not address it fully, if at all. If you recall, we consulted on long-term prisoners. I am trying to remember whether that was last summer or the summer before—[Interruption.] It was in 2024. We consulted because we wanted to consider the issue and seek views from victim support organisations and from those who work in the field.

You will be well aware that long-term prisoners are subject to the parole process, so there is a complexity to any change to their release arrangements. As someone who used to work with long-term prisoners and write parole reports, I am more than aware of the risk profile that is associated with long-term prisoners.

There is a question—and it is a question on which I have an open mind—whether, if the prison population were to be reduced further and there were fewer short-term prisoners, thus enabling more rehabilitative work to be done with long-term prisoners, we would have the balance right for long-term prisoners who have determinate sentences, by which I mean those people who are returning to our community at some point. Is there a question in there about better progression and better step-down facilities, and about the balance of how much of their sentence they spend in custody and how much they spend under strict licence conditions—perhaps even electronic monitoring—and under the threat of recall?

There are concerns about prisoners who do not qualify for parole and are released automatically six months before the end of their sentence. They could have served several years. Does that serve the public well, in terms of testing, managing and preparing for release people who are eventually going to return to our communities? That is an argument on which we should have an open mind, at least.

The consultation definitely showed us that, because of the risk profile, any change to how long-term prisoners are managed cannot be made in the short term. It is not something to be done as an emergency measure. It needs to be consulted on and planned for, and additional investment would need to be made in community justice social work, for example. The increase in the number of those in the long-term population—that part of the population who require statutory social work input—means that community justice social work is facing considerable demand, given the statutory work that it has to do for the Parole Board for Scotland and so on. It therefore cannot be an emergency measure.

We will have to wait and see what the sentencing and penal policy commission comes back with. I am merely saying that I am aware of the potential benefits, but I am also aware of the risks and the investment that would need to be coupled with any change to how long-term prisoners are managed.

The short answer is that I have an open mind. I know what I am in favour of: community justice, home detention curfews and expanded use of electronic monitoring for those who are on community disposals and, indeed, those who are leaving prison. I am also very much in favour of making best use of the estate, and we have increased its capacity. I want to replace old and crumbling buildings and ensure that HMP Highland and HMP Glasgow are delivered.

Beyond the prisons that we are committed to building and beyond modernising the estate, I am not in favour of building our way out of this, because if we build, they will come. We already have a prison population of 8,400, and the challenge is to get to a more sustainable population, because that is in the interests of public safety.

We will alleviate the extremely difficult working conditions by reducing the prison population. I am acutely aware of the challenges that our prison officers and other partners, such as social work staff and the national health service nursing staff who also work in prisons, face. They need to be supported and enabled to do the job that they wish to do.

People join the Prison Service because they are focused on public safety and the protection of the public, but they are also invested in the rehabilitation of offenders, where that is appropriate and possible. As well as the safety of prisoners, we have to take the working conditions and safety of staff very seriously. I am very aware of the work and the views of the Prison Officers Association as well as those of the Prison Governors Association.

I am trying to be brief, convener, but would you like to hear anything about staff conditions from Ms Medhurst?

Thank you, convener, and good morning, colleagues. I very much welcome the opportunity to discuss the legislative consent memorandum, the supplementary LCM and the second supplementary LCM in relation to those proposals in the UK Government’s Crime and Policing Bill for which the Scottish Parliament has devolved competence.

This large and complex bill covers numerous policy areas and, although we support its overall purpose in so far as it extends to Scotland, we have not needed to accept every measure, for example in cases where we have our own legislation in place or have plans to introduce our own legislation, such as in relation to child retention abroad, subject to consultation. However, where there are benefits to Scotland, the Scottish Government is happy to propose legislative consent to the relevant provisions in the bill.

The bill covers a range of important topics, and I would like to draw your attention to a couple of its provisions. The bill provides for a new, UK-wide offence in order to disrupt adults who criminally exploit children, supporting a four-nations approach to tackling child criminal exploitation. My officials continue to work with the UK Government on the offence as further amendments to the bill are expected.

Related to the child criminal exploitation offence is the new offence of cuckooing, which will seek to criminalise individuals who take control of the home of a vulnerable individual by intimidation or other means and use it to carry out criminality. Members will be aware of the devastating impact that criminal exploitation and cuckooing can have on individuals and their families and it is hoped that the new powers will strengthen our ability to prosecute those who exploit vulnerable people.

I have recently addressed questions raised by the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee in relation to several delegated powers in the bill, including questions on the powers to implement international agreements on sharing information for law enforcement purposes and on the power to make consequential provision. I look forward to reading the DPLRC’s report in due course.

We expect more amendments to the bill, which will trigger a further supplementary LCM to be laid shortly. My officials are still liaising with the UK Government on the detail of those new clauses. However, we expect them to include measures covering offensive weapons, child criminal exploitation prevention orders and online child sex abuse. We had initially hoped that the amendments would have been tabled in the House of Lords in sufficient time for us to lodge a third supplementary LCM in advance of this committee meeting, but we now expect the additional amendments to be tabled around mid-October.

The third supplementary LCM will also recommend extending clause 41 in relation to providing for the child criminal exploitation offence. The extension of that clause to Scotland was previously included in the draft bill but was accidentally omitted from the second supplementary LCM.

There is not enough time during my short opening remarks to go into detail on all the clauses that are contained in the LCMs, but I am more than happy to answer any questions that the committee has.

We sometimes get into differences of opinion on things such as online advertising, to give one example. The internet and its regulation is reserved, but if what is being promoted on the internet relates to a service or a particular action, we will, on occasion, argue that that is of relevance to our devolved competencies.

In relation to safeguards and reassurance, the Scottish Government considers that the LCM process is engaged when provisions apply to Scotland for the purpose of legislative competence. In the case that I am referring to, it relates to the steps that are required

“to prevent the advertisement, sale and supply of unlawful weapons in Scotland.”

In this instance, the UK Government considers that the provisions are wholly reserved for the reasons that I have outlined—because they relate to internet services. However, we have a different view. The other area of difference is on barred lists.

It is possible to have differences of opinion whereby both sides are agreed on the principle. That is why I will ultimately come down on the side of what will help to protect communities in the here and now. There are always debates in various forums about where power should lie—those are debates that I do not stand back from—but the fact is that the Scottish Government and the UK Government want to strengthen the action that can be taken against the harms that are caused by the promotion and flogging of dangerous weapons online. I want police in Scotland to have powers to issue notifications to remove content.

There are safeguards for those who are accused of being perpetrators. The committee will be well aware of the work that we did on the Police (Ethics, Conduct and Scrutiny) (Scotland) Bill around barred and advisory lists. The provisions in the UK bill relate to specialist police forces, only two of which are relevant to Scotland: the British Transport Police and the National Crime Agency. We do not want people who have been found wanting in one law enforcement organisation to be able to get a job in another.

There are two aspects to what is proposed. In very broad terms, the provisions broaden the range of persons who can access the DVLA’s licence data. Essentially, we want to ensure that the police in Scotland have the same access to that information as is the case elsewhere in the UK.

We have been corresponding with the UK Government on the matter, because there are some sensitivities. We wanted to be satisfied that the purpose for access was appropriate. What has been negotiated with the UK Government is that the Scottish ministers will be statutory consultees when the regulations are prepared. That means that we will be able to involve and consult the Scottish Biometrics Commissioner, as well as Police Scotland.

I draw the committee’s attention to the comments that the former Minister of State for Policing, Fire and Crime Prevention, Diana Johnson, put on the record. She made it clear that, in the same way that the current powers cannot be used to enable matching with photos, it will not be possible for the powers in the bill to be used to access DVLA information in order to match that up with photos or live facial recognition. I am paraphrasing, but she said that the proposed measures were not a “Trojan horse” for wider use. We have engaged with policing partners and the commissioner, because the commissioner had concerns about that issue in the past.

My understanding is that the provisions are about broadening the range of persons who can access the DVLA’s licence data, so that those records are available for wider policy and law enforcement purposes, and to ensure that police officers can access that information quickly at the point of need when they have an operational need to do so. However, I will ask officials to address your point about offences.

You will get a heads-up when I get a heads-up.

For background, the UK Government legislated for a new offence in the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025. We had asked for provision to be made in the Crime and Policing Bill, but the UK Government was not able to add provision for Scotland. We intend to explain the position of Scotland on the current law on the sharing of deepfakes, which is an offence. We will seek views on expanding the law to cover the creation of deepfakes. The sharing aspect is covered; the issue is around the creation of deepfakes.