Chamber and committees

Thank you for the invitation to speak to these amendment regulations.

The Social Offences Act 2003 and the subsequent Sexual Offences Act 2003 (Notification Requirements) (Scotland) Regulations 2007 were introduced to make people safer and to manage and mitigate the risk that is presented by those who commit sexual offences. Those who are convicted of an offence that is included in schedule 3 to the 2003 act are subject to notification requirements. The process of notification involves meeting a prescribed set of requirements for the information that an offender must provide to the police during their notification period. That includes information such as their date of birth, national insurance number, address, passport and bank and credit card details. There are also wider risk assessment and risk management planning arrangements in place for that cohort, all of which are managed under MAPPA, the multi-agency public protection arrangements.

The proposed regulations will add a new notification requirement relating to gender recognition certificates. When an offender who is subject to notification requirements makes an initial notification to the police, they will be required to provide information as to whether they are in the application process for a gender recognition certificate, or have obtained a full gender recognition certificate since the date of conviction.

The Scottish ministers committed to that measure during the passage of the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill. Although the Government always recognised the considered risk of public protection harm in that area to be low, and the bill has not been commenced because it could not go to royal assent, we are implementing this change as we committed to, in recognition of the bill. The information will be made available routinely to Police Scotland, which can weigh its relevance to risk accordingly.

All the existing measures that might allow Police Scotland to act in relation to the GRC applications process remain unchanged. If an application were in progress, there would be nothing to stop the police from writing to the gender recognition panel, which could consider whether the fixed criteria in the act for granting or refusing an application were met. This measure is not a barrier to anyone who is seeking a gender recognition certificate; it is an additional notification requirement for those who have been convicted of a relevant offence.

In developing the regulations, I have met Scottish Trans to seek to allay any fears that the wider transgender community may have. My officials have met Police Scotland to discuss the operational elements of policing the requirement.

I am happy to answer any questions.

That is my understanding. It has happened before with other SSIs in which I have brought forward action in relation to the prison population. Parliament has exercised its right to send instruments to the chamber, to be debated and voted on.

You asked about home detention curfew. I appreciate that this is confusing, because we are talking about alignment with other legislation and other early release provisions, such as the short-term prisoner 40 programme and home detention curfew. This measure is essentially about the removal of foreign nationals; therefore, the alignment does not connect in a real-world way, because foreign nationals are not eligible for, say, home detention curfew. It is all about alignment in relation to calculating eligibility for early removal from our prison estate.

That is right.

Mr Kerr is quite correct to point to the fact that Police Scotland and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service have been exemplars with regard to reform. The success of their reforms presents a challenge to other parts of the public sector. The reforms made very significant savings, but those are not savings that now sit in a bank account somewhere; they are savings in terms of resource that did not have to be spent.

The investment in Police Scotland since its reform in 2013 is in excess of £14.5 billion. I am not giving away any state secrets here but, for some time, capital budgets have been very challenged. We have had more than a decade of austerity. The anticipation, based on previous information from the UK Government, is that the overall capital budget for the Scottish Government will reduce in real terms by 2.5 per cent. That will have implications across the board. Nonetheless, the police capital budget for this financial year was increased to £70 million. Police Scotland should be commended for its estates master plan, which shows a clear road to reform and modernisation, as well as its maintenance aspirations. We know that, when resource is available, Police Scotland will always put that capital resource to good use, because it has clear plans, as set out in its estates master plan.

We have tried to help as much as possible with multiyear planning. For the first time in a long time, we have been able to progress indicative plans for three years’ resource and four years’ capital. When the Scottish Government budget is published, it is published alongside the Scottish spending review, the draft infrastructure delivery plan and the draft infrastructure strategy. All of that is about giving as much certainty as we can—we do not have all the cards, powers or control—and supporting coherence, not just across justice but across the public sector.

I am making a number of cases on a number of issues, not just with respect to policing but across the needs of the justice portfolio. I am heartened that we all seem to agree that the targeted resource for retail crime has been effective. There is some very encouraging data from the retail crime task force; Assistant Chief Constable Mairs has been doing a great job leading that work, which has been valued and appreciated by retailers. I spoke earlier about the changing nature of crime. Crimes such as housebreaking have reduced dramatically over the years, but retail crime, including shoplifting, has continued to rise. My concern about shoplifting is that it can be associated with more organised elements of crime. It certainly has an impact on our economy and is of great concern to retailers, as well as front-line shop workers.

There are several strands to that question. I know that Ms Clark takes a significant interest in community justice and in justice social work. I always appreciate it when people are prepared to champion the work of justice social work staff as much as that of registered social workers. Here I should probably make a declaration, given that in my past life I was a social worker myself.

I accept that there are increasing case loads and complexity. That trend is mirrored in the size of the prison population, as well as in the work that is expected of justice social work staff. Ms Clark will be familiar with the fact that, over the past two years, I have increased justice social work funding by £25 million to £159 million. The useful thing to bear in mind is that none of that £159 million is spent on staff salaries, which come instead from the overall local government settlement. Therefore, the local government settlement has a bearing here and will be important for me, as justice secretary, to consider, just as it will be for other cabinet secretaries.

In the longer term there has been growth in the justice social work workforce. Since 2015, the number of staff there has increased by 18.6 per cent, which is more than double the overall increase in the general social work workforce. However, I am concerned that, over the past year, the number of justice social work staff has decreased a little, by around 3 to 3.5 per cent. One of the reasons why I was an advocate for establishing a national social work agency is that, after the police, social work—not only justice social work, but social work as a whole—is the next biggest public protection workforce in Scotland. In the whole of the social work profession there have been recruitment and retention challenges, particularly for newly qualified staff. The work of the national social work agency will be underpinned by a partnership agreement. Considerable work has been done on that, and there is now a memorandum of understanding with COSLA and our local government partners, who will, of course, be the employers in that respect.

Between the justice portfolio and the education portfolio, there have been endeavours to provide education packages, which offer support for social work students and more innovation around pathways into the profession. For example, starting in this academic year, there will be a graduate apprenticeship in social work. That is a great way to upskill staff in either general social work or justice social work to become registered social workers. A lot of effort is being made to bolster that. On the one hand, I want more resource to be put into justice social work, particularly around broadening the range of electronic monitoring. On the other hand, it is not just about the top line; any growth in investment needs to be matched by a growth in staff.

I am grateful to Ms Clark. I note that she serves on the DPLR Committee, which is not a committee that I have ever had the pleasure of serving on.

I assure Ms Clark that I have had more than one discussion with my officials on what is, I admit, an unusual approach. I am not at all surprised by the DPLR Committee’s commentary.

I will not reiterate the policy intentions, because members will understand where we are with the prison population and the necessity for further action—I think that we all agree on that. There is no one solution to managing our prison population—there are many solutions—and every initiative and effort counts in that regard. In a moment, I will hand over to Ms Hutchison to comment on the more technical points.

Taking this forward through primary legislation is, of course, technically possible, notwithstanding that we are running out of time in this parliamentary session. I would be concerned about the time that it would take to make similar provision and the delay that that would cause. For me, the approach to finding a route forward for the policy change with regard to foreign national offenders is a pragmatic one. Given that we have the power to make that change through an SSI, I have chosen to use it, as it represents, in my view, the most efficient and effective way to enable the early removal of foreign national offenders from our prisons as soon as possible.

I am confident that Parliament has nevertheless been given what I would consider a meaningful opportunity to scrutinise our proposals with both this SSI and the one to follow, given that they are subject to affirmative procedure. That comes with an opportunity for the committee to take evidence, prior to Parliament being given the opportunity to approve the instruments as part of the process.

I will ask Ms Hutchison if she has anything further to add, for Ms Clark’s interest, on some of the aspects around drafting.

Yes, in terms of process, but—and I say this with respect—the committee is here today to scrutinise the instrument. I accept that the process is unusual, but I have a prison population issue to address. However, what you have outlined as to the purpose of the SSI is correct.

Yes, under the victim notification scheme, victims can be notified about the release of prisoners. It is my understanding that, as removal from the UK is a reserved matter, victims would not be notified of the actual removal from the country. However, Mr Kerr and others will remember the amendments on the governance of the victim notification scheme in what is now the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Act 2025, which will better allow those responsible for the removal to work with the Scottish Government to help victims receive more meaningful information, to the extent that that is possible under devolved law.

There are currently limitations, and we will try to address the issue as far as we can, within our powers and under the legislation that we have recently passed, while seeking to engage the UK Government on it. I accept that being notified of partial information will be deeply unsatisfactory. If someone receives a notification that the perpetrator in their case has been released, that may well cause anxiety, and that anxiety would be unnecessary if the person knew that the perpetrator was subject to other procedures that meant that they were being removed from the country.

Are you looking for an update?