Chamber and committees

I agree with the member, because I have seen the impact of the initiative in my own consistency. The evaluation of phase 4 of cashback for communities, which ran from 2017 to 2020, was published in December last year, and, during that phase, the initiative reached more than 100,000 young people. Involvement in the programme was found to have directly improved the wellbeing of more than 80,000 young people; to have moved 35,000 young people on to a positive destination such as a new job or further education; and, specifically, to have reduced the antisocial or criminal behaviour of more than 80,000 young people. More than two thirds of the young people who were involved were from the most deprived areas in Scotland.

A quote from one of our cashback for communities participants in the Action for Children behavioural change, wellbeing and inclusion service demonstrates the impact that the programme has on the young people of Scotland:

““I wasnae doing anything with my life … now, seven months down the line, I’m in my first year of training and I’ll be starting an apprenticeship ... In four years, I’ll be a fully qualified electrician.”

The story of the success that we are having with those initiatives to divert people away from a life of crime is not told often enough.

Will the member acknowledge that there are on average a third more police officers, as a percentage of the population, in Scotland than there are in England and Wales; that they are paid at a higher rate; and that we have substantially invested in the police, unlike the Conservative Government in England?

I am pleased to answer the question, which I was not able to do in response to another Conservative member. Edward Mountain would know the answer to the question if he had read our manifesto, which I commend to him—it was the manifesto that won the election. Perhaps he would like to read it.

I thank the member for her challenge, but I am sure that she knows that decisions on investigations are for the investigatory authorities. However, in her own words, she mentioned the level of resource and effort that the police have put into that case. I am sure that that will continue and I am happy to raise the case with the new Lord Advocate when that person is appointed.

I am grateful for the opportunity to consider some of the most important challenges that our justice system faces. I want to use the time to build on my recent productive discussions with other parties’ justice spokespeople on how we can deliver on the Government’s ambition to achieve a faster, fairer and more effective justice system for the people of Scotland.

The Covid pandemic and essential public health measures have posed severe challenges to the operation of our justice system. That has been the case for jurisdictions internationally. We are under no illusions about the major impact of the pandemic, and I am sure that members across the chamber will be keen to highlight that existing pressures were building across the justice system pre-Covid. It is therefore appropriate to reflect on the actions that have been taken and on the progress that has been made across the sector during the period.

The Scottish Government responded swiftly to the immediate challenges of Covid-19, and the Parliament passed two emergency coronavirus acts—the Coronavirus (Scotland) Act 2020 and the Coronavirus (Scotland) (No 2) Act 2020—which continue to provide vital powers and measures to help protect the public, maintain essential public services and support the economy during the current outbreak of the coronavirus.

Remote jury centres are an example of such measures, and I was fortunate enough to visit a centre yesterday. The use of cinema complexes as a base for jury centres has enabled the jury trials that deal with the most serious cases to continue after they first restarted in July last year.

The Scottish Courts and Tribunal Service’s quarterly statistical bulletin, which was published last week, shows that, despite the challenges at the High Court in recent months, evidence-led trials have been running at an even higher level than was the case pre-Covid, which is a huge achievement.

The resumption of court business was possible only because of the collaborative efforts of our justice partners, third sector organisations and the judiciary and defence community to innovate and embrace new ideas. In the chamber today, we should praise all those who were involved in ensuring the continuation of justice during this most challenging period.

As is the position in England and Wales, the justice system in Scotland faces challenges and significant backlogs of cases that existing capacity or resources cannot address. We have therefore committed an additional £50 million in this year’s budget to further support recovery across the justice system. That includes a capacity increase in both the High Court and the sheriff court.

In our civil justice system, in which backlogs remain, great progress has been made to manage recovery through the use of virtual proceedings, the electronic transfer of documents and innovative digital solutions. Although restrictions greatly hampered their delivery of face-to-face services, our community justice delivery partners have continued to support a wide range of community justice services throughout the pandemic, with a focus on prioritising vulnerable people and those who present an imminent and serious risk of harm.

One of our key priorities throughout the pandemic was to ensure that victims continued to be supported, to feel reassured and to have confidence in the justice system. We were particularly aware of the risks for women and children who were experiencing gender-based violence, so we provided an additional £5.75 million to front-line services so that they could respond to an increase in demand from victims of abuse. We also increased Victim Support Scotland’s victims fund to help meet the immediate financial needs of the most vulnerable victims during the pandemic.

Our prisons are a unique setting, and additional measures have been required to keep those who live and work in prison safe. We took important action to ensure that those in prison could maintain family contact through virtual visits and the use of mobile phones or in-cell phones across the estate. To the credit of prison and national health service staff, the virus has been well controlled in our prisons, although of course we must remain vigilant.

A challenge remains in relation to remand cases—the people who are in prison but who have yet to have their trial or who are awaiting their sentence. The number of people on remand has gone up during the pandemic at a time when overall prisoner numbers have reduced. Although decisions on bail and remand are a matter for the independent judiciary, the Scottish Government has taken steps to ensure that community-based alternatives to remand are available. At the end of last year, the Scottish Government introduced regulations to allow the electronic monitoring of people on bail. A number of justice partners have been working to prepare for that change and, subject to all partners completing that work successfully, the process can be fully commenced after the summer.

I thank all members for their contributions to the debate, my first as Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Veterans. It has been informative and wide-ranging and has demonstrated our collective ambition to achieve a more effective justice system for the people of Scotland. There will be different views about how that endeavour might be achieved, but I welcome the honesty and commitment that most members have shown and that will help to inform that journey.

I opened our discussion with a commitment to try to build consensus. We can see how difficult that will be, but I will try to do that where possible and I have tried to do so in the conversations that I have already had with opposition spokespeople.

I repeat the genuine aspiration for the Parliament to make collective progress. Today’s exchanges have in no way diminished my appetite for collaboration in the context of the Government’s extensive and ambitious programme of commitments and as we seek to ensure that our justice system is exemplary in its handling of victims, witnesses and the accused. I look forward to hearing genuine ideas and suggestions as to how that might best be achieved and I know that that will lead to future productive debate.

It is also important that we discuss in more detail the range of levers currently available to justice partners as we emerge into the recovery phase of the pandemic and consider what further action may be possible. I said how impressed I was by the remote jury centre initiative, which I observed yesterday. I recognise the concerns that were rightly raised by representative bodies at the start of the pandemic and the need for appropriate, on-going assessment and analysis. That innovation has raised questions and delivered opportunities that were not previously considered to be appropriate. The use of remote juries is now a feature of our justice system and is one that is being looked at by justice systems worldwide as they respond to the Covid environment. When compared with other jurisdictions, Scotland has led the charge on this initiative. We must think further about how those centres will feature in the medium and long term; that thinking should take place openly and publicly.

I will try to pick up some of the key points that have been made. There have been many such points, so please forgive me if I miss out any—it is not intentional. Many of them have common themes.

I congratulate the other justice spokespeople—the newer ones and those who are more established in the role—on their positions.

I will come back to Pam Gosal’s speech towards the end of my remarks.

I thank Rona Mackay for her remarks, especially in relation to a different, human rights-centred approach to justice.

I congratulate Katy Clark on her first speech in the chamber. I, too, was a Unison branch officer and shop steward. I never reached the exalted rank of a solicitor, but that was a great time to be in Unison. I listened to her comments and found that there are a lot of areas in which we can agree.

I think that James Dornan alone raised the very important issue of sectarianism and anti-Catholicism, which we must have regard to.

Michelle Thomson mentioned the register of interests, which we will take forward. I am sure that many of her other comments will be picked up by the Minister for Community Safety, who will have responsibility in the areas that she talked about.

I was keen to listen constructively to Alexander Stewart, but that can be done only on the basis that there are facts. People can have their own views, but they cannot really have their own facts. It is a simple fact that there has been a reduction of 17,000 police officers in England. In Scotland, there are more than 1,000 more police officers than there were when we came to office. Crime has gone down substantially more in Scotland than it has elsewhere, and police officers in Scotland are paid more than they are paid elsewhere. We cannot invent others or change those facts. If Alexander Stewart wants to discuss that—I would be happy to be involved in such a discussion—he should at least have regard to the facts.

Audrey Nicoll made a fantastic speech. In particular, she mentioned wellbeing as a feature of our justice system and policing. Policing involves much more than law enforcement; it is about the wellbeing of society.

Like other members, I thought that Foysol Choudhury’s speech was excellent. Education is not my responsibility, but the point that he made about using education to teach history that we might not otherwise want to face, about how wealth was accumulated in this country and the UK is a very good one. I made that point myself in a debate before the election, and I am confident that the education ministers will take that forward.

Christine Grahame rightly highlighted the civil side. That is a huge part of the system, and it probably impacts more people than the criminal side. I will make a genuine offer: I am happy to mediate between Christine Grahame and Edward Mountain as to whose pen that is. I warn Christine Grahame that possession is nine tenths of the law.

We can but try.

Emma Harper made a number of very good points, some of which the minister will be responsible for. I am happy to respond in writing to some of the other issues that I am responsible for; it would take too long to do that just now. She made a number of good points, not least on the location of jury centres.

Pam Gosal’s speech was very much like Alexander Stewart’s. It may be that simply giving a litany of anti-SNP diatribes is thought to be the way to go, but I think that, if members want to have a genuinely constructive debate, that is not the way to go. A dialogue is better than a monologue, and accepting what would have been, I hope, a constructive intervention would have been more helpful to genuine debate. I hope that, in time, Pam Gosal will be able to take genuine interventions and will try to have a dialogue rather than deliver a monologue. We will not get anywhere if people simply try to trash the entire justice and policing system in this country, as happened before the election. Let us start from the fact that, if there are things that are wrong, I will accept that, and I am willing to take on those challenges. Let us not try to trash the entire system and say that it is the worst in the world, or whatever else.

Russell Findlay was right about serious organised crime. That was not mentioned, and it is extremely important. I genuinely offer him the offer that the chief constable and others made to me to talk about some of the serious and very good work that is going on. We cannot do all of that in the public domain. I realise that he will have reservations about how effective that is, but I think that that would help to inform some of his views about what the police are doing. To be honest, the attacks on the SNP were just pointless. The contribution could have been much more productive. If a genuine dialogue is wanted, I am happy to be involved in that.

I accept that Russell Findlay knows more than I do about some of the historical cases that he mentioned. The Criminal Cases Review Commission will look at those cases. I am sure that he will have tried that before. It is not for me to reopen former cases. I am not saying that some of the points that he has raised—especially the one about Mr Mcleod, which I am aware of—are not serious cases, but such injustices are looked at in a particular way. I am, again, perfectly happy to have a genuine discussion with him about the matter.

I turn to the amendments, and there is much in them that I am happy to agree with. I wish to highlight a few areas in specific amendments. Labour’s amendment supports our overall ambition for the justice sector. However, it is worth noting that decisions around domestic abuse courts, and all specialist courts, are currently a constitutional matter for the Lord President of the Court of Session and the senior judiciary. In my view, we should consider the issues of jury sizes and some aspects of the changes that Lady Dorrian proposed—I think that Jamie Greene made that point as well. I cannot accept the amendment now, but I am willing to come back to that point. [Interruption.]

I really do not have much time to take an intervention—I am sorry. I am trying to wind up. I have had less time than Opposition speeches so far.

In relation to the Liberal Democrats’ amendment on fatal accident inquiries, the Parliament agreed substantial reforms for the inquiries into fatal accidents and sudden deaths in 2016, which were passed with unanimous support. Additional resources have been applied, and that is having an effect. I do not deny that some high-profile cases give cause for concern, but currently less than 2 per cent of fatal accidents or sudden deaths resulted in FAIs that have lasted more than two years. We will continue to work on the matter, but I cannot accept that amendment.

There is much that we can agree on in the Conservatives’ amendment. I agree with the need to continue to place victims and their rights at the heart of the justice system, which is an issue that I tried to cover in my opening remarks and which I know that both the Government and the Conservative Party will come back to.

We can also agree on restorative justice and secure funding, but there is so much else to consider—not least, the not proven verdict. If we were to go with the Conservatives’ proposal, we really would have to consider the other aspects to the not proven verdict, with regard to jury size and many other aspects in the justice system. It is important that we take that work forward, which the consultation will allow us to do, so I am not shutting the door on that point by any means, but I cannot accept it and other points in the Conservative amendment today. In addition, summary courts can already use their maximum sentencing powers in dealing with attacks on emergency workers—I think that only the Conservatives refused to support the legislation on emergency workers in 2006.

We are happy to support the Greens’ amendment today, including the commitment to human rights, which Maggie Chapman articulated very well, and the need to ensure holistic approaches to address “underlying causes of crime”. However, it is worth noting that the issues of enforcement against corporate and environmental crime that the amendment mentions are operational matters for the appropriate regulatory authorities. In relation to the point about institutional violence, which Pauline McNeill raised, I have spoken with the prison service and we have seen reports from Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons for Scotland that say that a good relationship exists between prison staff and prisoners. We are happy to support the general thrust of the Greens’ amendment, especially in relation to a human rights approach and other innovations. I am happy to conclude for the Government with those positions on the amendments.

I heard and understood the First Minister’s response earlier. We are willing to investigate the matter. I am sure that Liam Kerr is aware that there are a number of issues around body-worn cameras. The police are aware of those issues and we need to look at them. There will be body-worn cameras for the armed Police Scotland officers who are attending the 26th UN climate change conference of the parties—COP26—and we are looking at a further roll-out in due course.

Throughout the period of renewal that I have talked about for our justice system, we will continue to engage with partners. As I have said, the Crown Office has, at the direction of the outgoing Lord Advocate, significantly reformed arrangements for the investigation of deaths, to which it has applied significant additional resources from the Scottish Government.

We will ensure that people and communities across Scotland are safe. As we do that, we will continue to invest the money that is recovered from individuals. Phase 5 of the cashback for communities programme, which will run until 2023, is providing £19 million to support diversionary activity and life-changing interventions to those who are most at risk of being involved in antisocial behaviour, offending and entering the justice system.

The final two areas that I will highlight are community justice and prisons. It is helpful to consider the context that is set out in the 2019 report “Hard Edges Scotland”, which showed that people in the criminal justice system commonly experience severe and multiple disadvantage, including homelessness, substance misuse, offending, mental ill health and domestic violence or abuse.

The latest statistics on prisons show that individuals from the 10 per cent most deprived areas are overrepresented among prison arrivals by a factor of 3. That has been a consistent picture across the past decade. In addition, the proportion of individuals arriving in prison who report having no fixed abode has increased across a decade of austerity from 4.4 per cent to 7.5 per cent.

Those are societal issues that need to be addressed beyond the justice system. By helping individuals earlier, we can avoid damaging impacts being visited on future generations. Our aim is that prisons should be reserved for individuals who pose a serious risk of harm, and that periods of imprisonment—in particular, periods of remand and short custodial sentences—should be imposed only when there are no alternatives.

For those who end up in custody, our commitment is to continue to invest in the modernisation of the prison estate, to ensure that it is fit for purpose. That includes completing the construction of the new, transformative female estate and progressing with replacements for HMP Barlinnie and HMP Inverness. It is worth noting that the annual average cost per prisoner place for 2019-20 was more than £38,000.

Short custodial sentences do little to reduce the likelihood of reoffending, which is why in 2019 we extended the presumption against short sentences to sentences of 12 months or less. Such sentences disrupt families and communities, they impact on life chances and they adversely affect employment opportunities and stable housing—the very things that support diversion from offending, as evidence shows.

The Government’s sustained and long-term programmes to promote community safety, crime prevention and the rehabilitation of individuals have meant less crime and fewer victims than a decade ago, and it is worth pointing out that the police service, which Liam Kerr mentioned, has done a fantastic job in helping to reduce crime over the past 15 years.

In developing a new national community justice strategy and in exploring legislative options to divert people from prison, we aim to make our society safer for everyone—reducing reoffending, reducing recorded crime and, ultimately, reducing the number of victims.

As an example of the preventative and cross-cutting work that will be undertaken over the session, the Minister for Community Safety will take a thematic, clear and strategic approach to the interaction of women with the justice system.

Thankfully, we have one of the most diverse Parliaments ever elected. I am very proud that my party has more female than male MSPs. We also have a more generally diverse and potentially more progressive Parliament than before. There is a real opportunity to harness that diversity in working collectively across portfolios and, I hope, across parties to address systemic issues and bring forward progressive policies that will help to steer us through the recovery and meet the challenges of the future.

I move,

That the Parliament commends the commitment, dedication and innovation of justice partners, staff and key stakeholders in ensuring that the justice system can recover, renew and transform as Scotland emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic, while looking towards reform that delivers a faster, fairer and more effective system; acknowledges key challenges and the ongoing need for measures to both continue to protect public health and to support the recovery of the justice system as it emerges from this most challenging period; recognises the investment of additional resources in helping to address the impact and encourages continued collaboration to ensure that the interests of victims and those who rely on the justice system remain at the heart of necessary reforms; recognises the inventive solutions that have been adopted, including the use of cinemas as remote jury centres, moving civil business online and enabling prisoners to maintain family contact through virtual visits, but, as in other jurisdictions worldwide, recognises the impact of the pandemic on the delivery of justice in Scotland on victims, witnesses and those accused of criminal offences, including those on remand, indicating the need for a clear focus on addressing the backlogs in court business and ensuring cases are progressed within a reasonable time period, all in order to deliver a modern justice system fit for future challenges.

I am more than willing to engage in that discussion. The member will have heard what I said about a victims commissioner and additional trauma support for victims. Would he acknowledge that the changes that we have very recently made, which came into effect on 21 March, in relation to cases involving what he has termed Michelle’s law and Suzanne’s law, take that substantially further down the road? If the member introduces a bill, will he take into account those changes, which I would think are welcome to the Conservatives?

To be honest, I am not sure about the connection that the member makes between the powers in the coronavirus legislation and the extension of remand, but I am happy to look at the matter further. The changes that happened during the pandemic led to an increased number of prisoners on remand—that is self-evident from the backlog in the courts. Through some of the measures that have been introduced, the new powers and the coronavirus restrictions have helped to reduce that backlog. If I am missing Jamie Greene’s point makes, I am happy to come back to it.

As we emerge from the crisis, maintaining a legal aid sector will be crucial to recovery. We hugely appreciate and value the legal profession and the role that it has played during the pandemic. That is why we committed to bringing forward a package of measures, worth up to £20 million, to help support the legal aid sector, as well as delivering the first stage of a 10 per cent increase in fees in March.