Chamber and committees

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. I was unable to access the app. I would have voted yes.

Audrey Nicoll is, of course, right that Jamie Greene’s question raised only a very small and partial part of the picture. Crimes of dishonesty and vandalism decreased in the latest year to their lowest levels since the 1970s. Jamie Greene did not mention that, of course.

We are continuing to back that and other reductions in crime with our investment in front-line policing. We have increased police funding year on year since 2016-17, and we will invest £1.4 billion in 2022-23. Our investment amounts to more than £10 billion since the creation of Police Scotland in 2013 and has helped to ensure that officer numbers are 5.4 per cent higher than they were in 2007.

Of course, despite the weeks and months that we have had of the Tories saying that there should be massive increases to the police and justice budgets, when it came to it they offered no amendment to the budget that this Government proposed.

Since 2006-07, violent crime in Scotland has fallen significantly, including a 15 per cent fall in homicide in 2020-21, to its lowest level since 1976. Surveys of the population show that adults in Scotland were less likely to experience crime in 2019-20 than those living in England and Wales.

Although that progress is encouraging, the stability in violent crime levels over recent years highlights that more needs to be done. The Scottish Government is clear that any act of violence is one too many, and in 2022-23 we are providing additional funding of 14 per cent to the violence reduction unit to support increased violence prevention activities. We continue to work with Police Scotland and other partners to prevent violent crime, including through the work of Medics Against Violence and delivery of the hospital navigator service.

Jamie Greene completely disregards the point that I made about the reduction in homicides to their lowest level since 1976 and the reduction that we have seen since 2006-07. There have been huge reductions that have been substantially higher than those in England and Wales, such that people in Scotland are much less likely, and feel themselves to be much less likely, to become victims of violent crime. However, as I have acknowledged, violent crime is a serious issue. We have dealt with it, and we continue to deal with it through, for example, the No Knives, Better Lives initiative, which has been deemed to have been extremely successful and is now copied in other parts of the United Kingdom, including London, where people have engaged with it.

The annual crime statistics, which are the most accurate records, show that recorded crime remains at one of the lowest levels since 1974. Non-sexual crimes of violence fell by 4 per cent between 2019-20 and 2020-21. The most recent years have, of course, been affected by the pandemic, as they have been in all jurisdictions, and the falls in the levels of some crimes that we saw during the lockdown period have been followed by increases. We are very conscious of that, and we are taking forward a number of initiatives in relation to crimes of sexual violence and violent crimes more generally, such as No Knives, Better Lives, which I mentioned.

Of course, Jamie Greene misses the fact that it was the Conservatives who brought in automatic early release and voted in the Parliament against ending automatic early release. We will therefore take no lessons from the Tories in relation to that.

We will, of course, look seriously at the issues that the Conservatives have raised. Jamie Greene has quite rightly raised the issue of remand and our prisons. That is what the initiatives that we are taking forward, which are subject to consultation, seek to address. I would have hoped that we would have received some support from the Conservatives—if not support for what we intend to do, at least some ideas from them about what they would do in relation to remand.

We have seen massive reductions in homicides and in the handling of offensive weapons. It is important to mention that the number of emergency admissions to hospitals due to assaults with a sharp object has fallen by 51 per cent from 2006-07 until now. It is also important that, as I mentioned previously, people in Scotland feel that they are less likely to be a victim of crime. We can bandy around the figures from here to eternity and mention different years or monthly statistics versus annual statistics, but the simple fact is that there is less crime in Scotland than there was when the Government came in, there is less crime in Scotland than there is in other parts of the UK and individuals feel that that is the case, there are more police officers who are better paid, and we have a very good track record on tackling crime across Scotland over the past 15 years.

You are absolutely right that it comes down to judgments. However, it is also true that, if we were to seek to pardon those convictions, it would set quite a precedent for similar offences that are committed now or in the future. Based on the consultations that we have had, I think that there would be a lot less sympathy when it comes to offences such as street fights, intimidatory conduct, violence or damage to property.

The point about the picket line is important. Our view—which, as you said, is based on a judgment that we have to make—is that, on the balance of probabilities, the miners’ conduct on a picket line or demonstration, or when going through a community to attend one of them, was directly related to support for saving jobs, rather than being an action born of anger or retribution against an individual. Therefore, you are right that it is a question of judgment, and that is the judgment that we are making. However, we will, of course, listen to other points of view.

For the people who have called for the pardon, including former MSP Neil Findlay, this was about reconciliation. Neil Findlay’s views on compensation might be different from mine, but the rationale for the pardon was about reconciliation, as I said in my answer to Alexander Stewart.

A compensation scheme would not be consistent with the proposal for miners to self-assess their eligibility for a pardon. We would need a much more stringent process if people were applying for compensation, and, given the lack of records and so on, that would be problematic for quite a number of the individuals who are involved.

If we had such a scheme, we would run the risk of the bill moving away from its intended symbolic effect into the territory of questioning decisions that were made by the judiciary at the time. To be clear, we are not doing that—we are not quashing any convictions; we do not have the ability to look back in time, assemble the evidence and do that, in any event. Also, a compensation scheme would run the risk of creating a precedent for pardons that are granted. Other legislation for pardoning convictions such as the Historical Sexual Offences (Pardons and Disregards) (Scotland) Act 2018 did not offer compensation, so there would be a risk of legal challenge.

Employment and industrial relations are reserved to the UK Government. The Scottish Government was not the employer, was not party to the dispute and was not in existence at the time. A compensation scheme for loss of earnings, pension and other rights would touch on employment issues, which are for the UK Government to consider. We have pressed—and will continue to press—the UK Government to hold a full public inquiry. That is the place where such issues should be discussed or addressed. For us, we think that the pardon is a reasonable measure to try to introduce some reconciliation in communities that were driven apart during the strike.

Yes, I think that more can be done, and I am more than happy to listen to any suggestions that members of the committee may have in that regard—indeed, they have made some ready.

There will be attendant publicity as a result of the committee’s deliberations and when the bill progresses to the chamber and is—I hope—passed. That will bring additional awareness across the country. I also hope that seeing what is being done here will give heart to those in Wales and England who are in a similar position.

I have already mentioned our looking at the idea of writing to as many people as we can legitimately identify. We are also looking at going beyond that measure, where that is possible. I am more than happy to commit to giving further thought to what else we can do to try to address the psychologically scarring effects of the strike and the scarring effects on individuals from having a conviction. For many, that will be their only conviction—they had never looked to get into trouble with the police at any other stage of their lives. I am certainly open to suggestions on how we can maximise the impact of our approach.

You are right about compensation. We have to remember what going through a compensation route would mean for those individuals who are still alive, rather than their getting an automatic pardon. I think that it is important that we focus on the pardon.

On your last question, I have tried to make the point that we will continue to put pressure on the UK Government to take responsibility. That is not to blame current members of the Government for things that happened in the 1980s, but the Government has a responsibility to address some of the issues of concern. We have said that consistently, and we will continue to say that to the UK Government.

I certainly think that that is problematic. It might surprise some people to find that the number of offences that are not listed is much greater than the number of ones that are, so we would have to do a much longer list to say which ones are not subject to the pardon. That approach will work only if Parliament is minded to favour a blanket pardon with very limited exceptions.

As things stand, there are three qualifying offences, but the 5 per cent covers a number of other offences, including vandalism, assault, possession of an offensive weapon and careless driving. We could set out the offences not to be included, but I think that it is easier—not least given that we have defined who is a miner, and that it is miners we are seeking to address—to say which offences, specifically, are being pardoned. I think that that is a more clear-cut approach for the public to understand and for the miners concerned themselves—if that addresses the question that you were asking.

In relation to injuries and other aspects, the National Association of Retired Police Officers and the police pension fund have a responsibility to look after their members, as do bodies such as the Scottish Police Federation, and they will do that very effectively.

The miners often lost all of that. They had no pension fund. I am not sure about their pensions but, if they were dismissed from their job, they certainly lost their employment rights.

You are right to say that there are some things, such as serious assault, that we are not looking to pardon. We have made that clear.

There is a distinction between pardons in this case and, say, pardons in relation to historical sexual offences, about which the Parliament said that a whole category of offences was wrong. That whole category of offences breached people’s human rights. We are not saying that in this case. We are not saying that the body of law that was brought to bear or the justice system itself was wrong. We are not in a position to say that they were wrong, as we do not have the evidence or the ability to go back in time. However, there was not the fundamental and systematic undermining of people’s human rights, as there was with the sexual offences. Given that that is the case, we are not looking to quash any convictions. We are not doing that in this regard; we are providing a pardon, because of the exceptional circumstances.

You are right that there are some offences that would have had implications—sometimes serious implications—for individual police officers. You will have heard evidence on that from the National Association of Retired Police Officers. That is another reason for the approach that we are taking.