Chamber and committees

We have committed to investing more than half a billion pounds—£545.7 million—in improving the prison estate. The committee will know, from looking at our capital programme, exactly which prisons we are talking about replacing or upgrading. In the latter part of your question, you might have been referring to prisons such as Greenock and Dumfries that we have not been able to commit to replacing as we do not have the resources to do so. In those circumstances, however, we have been carrying out improvements across the piece. Indeed, even in prisons such as Barlinnie, which we are going to replace, we are making substantial improvements to the current facilities.

The fact is that much of the prison estate is pretty Victorian. In fact, I would compare the situation that it is in with that of the school estate back in 2007. Schools were in an appalling state, but things have been pretty much transformed since then. Moreover, we need only think of what has happened to our road network, with the Queensferry crossing, the Aberdeen western peripheral route or the dualling of the A9, which is progressing. There have been major changes to the infrastructure in Scotland, but, because of finance, we just cannot do everything all at once.

On whether funding can be brought forward, I remember that, five or six years ago, it was not unusual to have additional mid-year capital funding allocations, and we in the Government were often asked to quickly compile a list of shovel-ready projects—I was going to say “oven ready”, but that term has been kind of abused—that could be advanced quite quickly. We know what we would like to do with Dumfries, and we have an idea about what to do with Greenock. Greenock is an interesting case, given the other investments that could be made with regard to, for example, the police and the college there.

We are ready to go, but we can go only on the basis of the capital funding that we expect to receive. That is what the current capital programme is based on.

You make a very good point. On Monday, I was in Perth prison—to my surprise, I was released the same day. If you have been to that prison, you will know that it is a collection of buildings of different ages, and the size of a cell in one part can be different from the size of a cell in some of the older parts. That and other modern expectations of prisons need to be factored in to what we do.

For example, in other prisons, women’s cells have showers built in, but that is not the case for the other 96 per cent of the prison population, who are men. We therefore need to factor in those new expectations with regard to cell size and, indeed, security. Mr Findlay has repeatedly raised the serious issue of drugs in prisons, and the question is whether we can bake into the design of a prison something to address that. There is also the issue of district heating and other ways of making prisons as environmentally friendly as possible.

We are trying to do that sort of thing, with, for example, the issue of cell size being closely considered in relation to Barlinnie. Of course, such things are done at a certain point in time. It might well be that, in 10 or 15 years, we will have different expectations, but we need to ensure that we are up to the minute as far as possible with regard to people’s expectations and sensible thinking on such matters.

As Neil Rennick said and I have tried to say, the Crown Office will discuss that separately with the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Economy. It is a separate budget. The Lord Advocate has been before the committee in the past. She will discuss her budget.

I cannot speak for the Crown Office but, generally, we would like far greater apportionment of capital spending, even if it comes down to using the Scottish Government’s borrowing powers—there is a real case to be made for increased borrowing powers. There is much that we could do. We can spend to save. If we spend wisely on capital, we can make future reductions in our resource budget.

It is not unfair to say that we would all like more capital spending. The Crown Office would have to speak for itself in relation to that.

Mr Findlay’s question in the chamber yesterday provided me with an opportunity to say that the policing of COP26 has been superb. I know that we have to look at some particular actions but, overall, it has been superb. I say that because other justice and UK partners have been extremely impressed by the way in which Police Scotland went about the preparation, which was detailed and carried out over a long period. I thank the police for that.

We have made clear our expectation that the UK Government will bear all costs, including legacy costs, related to holding COP26 in Glasgow. That is the commitment that we were given originally. It was done through a memorandum of understanding that was agreed between the Governments and that records the participants’ agreements on financial and contractual liability for COP26. It includes funding for police, fire and ambulance services.

I am generally quite satisfied with the assurance framework that is in place, which is the means by which we negotiate about planned expenditure for COP26. We will hear from Donald McGillivray on that, but it has worked well.

One area where we did not reach full agreement was legal aid. That related to the weekend and out-of-hours work that has to be covered and, in that respect, the additional fees to be paid to solicitors acting on behalf of anyone who might be arrested. We have, I would say, reached a compromise position, given that we did not get everything that we wanted from the process.

All of the funding is for identified spending that is associated with hosting a safe and secure COP, and no funding will come from the arrangements beyond COP expenditure. For the committee’s information, Police Scotland secured around £60 million of funding up to the end of October to cover the known direct costs of policing COP26 as well as accommodation for the sizeable number of mutual aid officers coming from elsewhere in the United Kingdom. Because that is covered directly by the UK Government, none of that funding will come through us to be reclaimed.

The overall costs of policing the event will be known only post conference, when all relevant costs will be known and finalised. The assurance processes that I have witnessed seem fairly satisfactory to me but, as Donald McGillivray has been more intimately involved than me in this matter, it might be worth hearing from him.

Yes, and I think that that has been borne in mind even in prisons that are not scheduled for replacement but where new capital works are going on. Beyond that, in-cell telephony is being looked at for those prisons as well. As you have indicated, the hard-wired options are easier to manage and they make it easier to avoid some of the problems that we have had with the mobiles that were issued. That is being taken into account.

I will ask Neil Rennick to come in shortly. Your question prompts me to recall that I did not really answer the convener’s previous question on capacity.

As you said, we are looking at the other end—at how many people we put in prison. Shortly, we will have something to say on proposals that we want to bring forward in relation to remand and release. It is about sending the right people to prison—those who need to be in prison and will benefit from being there rather than in an alternative non-custodial diversion. That has to be part of the hard calculation that we will make as to what the future prison population will be.

In any event—the convener made this point and it is behind your question, as well—we should not end up without capacity, which has happened in the past. For example, Texas released tens of thousands of prisoners overnight, including many who had been convicted of drug offences, because the state could not cope with the prisoner population. Furthermore, the Supreme Court of California told the state that it had to release thousands of prisoners overnight because there was 200 per cent occupancy in the prisons.

We want to ensure that we have the right number of cells and facilities for people, but we also want to ensure that people go to prison when that is the best place for them to be and when it is where society needs them to be. There are two parts to the equation.

Specifically on women’s provision, the justice secretary before last made a judgment based on the best information that he had at the time. Neil Rennick, who was in post then, might want to say more.

That is a good point. For many years, the Scottish Government has asked the UK Government to move away from single-year budgets and the late notification of the budget.

We have tried to reflect the point in the funding for victims services, for which we have announced a three-year funding package. As is the case with all such matters, if other things happen, it might be possible to increase funding, so bear that in mind. However, I understand the point that many third sector organisations must make plans, including for facilities, well in advance of each funding year. Multiyear funding is under consideration not only in victims services, but across the justice portfolio and the whole of Government.

There are some situations in which we would not give multiyear funding, but I think that the point has been accepted. We have argued for that position from the UK Government, so we cannot really argue against other organisations wanting the same stability.

Yes, it is, although, as you said, only a proportion of that money comes from the justice budget. Substantial progress has already been made on the issue of children in the justice system. Since 2000, the number of under-18s who were proceeded against in Scotland’s courts has fallen by 81 per cent. The number of under-18s in custody—again, that is a justice system response—has decreased by 79 per cent, and there has been an 81 per cent reduction in children who were referred to the children’s reporter on offence grounds.

We are, however, looking closely at the future funding of secure care. Officials are discussing specific proposals with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and other partners. At this stage, that process can be summarised as being about investing in change—as you suggested in your question—guaranteeing accessibility and also keeping The Promise. I expect to be able to provide a further update early next year, at least on the justice elements of that, if the committee would find that useful.

It is not possible to say definitively, but we can probably get a good idea from looking at the establishment of previous commissioners’ offices. The establishment of the office of the Scottish Veterans Commissioner, which I was heavily involved in, might give you an indication of the cost. That can be readily obtained from SPICe.

I am happy to get further information on that and to provide the member with a detailed response. Obviously, it is predicated on the value of fines for convictions, and there has been a pretty big disruption to that process in our court system. I imagine that that accounts for it, but I am happy to look into it further and to provide any other relevant information, if that would help.