Chamber and committees

Further to the recommendation of the Drug Death Taskforce we are continuing to work with the UK Government and other devolved administrations regarding the expansion of access to drug paraphernalia.

This includes the provision of smoking inhalation devices which have been seen as an essential harm reduction tool for those smoking crack cocaine. The distribution of these devices would require an amendment to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971. As this legislation is reserved, such an amendment is not within the competence of the Scottish Parliament.

We are developing our new Palliative and End of Life Care Strategy, which has an overarching aim that everyone in Scotland receives well-coordinated, timely and high-quality palliative care, care around death and bereavement support based on their needs and preferences, including support for families and carers. We want people to receive care where they feel most comfortable. For many, but not all, this will be at home, supported by their family and friends and cared for by primary care teams and care staff.

We have established a number of working groups, including a Children and Young People’s Palliative Care Working Group and a Workforce Education, Training and Resources Working Group. These groups will develop evidence-based recommendations for future service planning, delivery, and improvements in equity of access and continuity of care. They will consider the actions that need to be taken to support the care of children and young people in their own homes, where appropriate. This includes determining what additional training and support community nursing teams may need to enable this.

The Medicines Act 1986 is governed by the UK Parliament. This means that any legislative changes in relation to the act are fully reserved to the UK Government and its ministers.

However, continuing the work done to make naloxone more widely available during the COVID-19 pandemic, Scottish Government officials are engaged with both COPFS and colleagues in the UK Office for Health Improvement and Disparities to ensure that those changes remain in place in Scotland. Following the 2021 consultation carried out by the UK Government into expanding the access to naloxone, Scottish Government officials are working with UK Government colleagues to push for amendments in current legislation at a UK level to ensure those changes introduced in Scotland are made permanent.

The current legal framework for Drug Checking facilities comes under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and an amendment to the act in relation to ‘Controlled Drugs’ which provides authorisation via the use of a license. The license can be applied for through the UK Home Office.

Scottish Government Officials will continue to work with Home Office colleagues as license applications from the proposed pilot cities progress. Police Scotland have also been involved in this work, alongside Crown Office.

The proposal currently with COPFS officials was developed by Glasgow Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) not the Scottish Government

Police Scotland have been involved in discussions about the establishment of a safer drug consumption facilities (SDCF) for a number of years, since Glasgow HSCP first proposed establishing one.

The Lord Advocate, in a statement to the Justice Committee in November 2021, was clear that any new proposal for an SDCF would, before it could be brought to the Lord Advocate, need to be, amongst other things, supported by those who would be responsible for policing such a facility, and by Police Scotland Official Report (parliament.scot) .

The initial proposal that was submitted to COPFS officials in June 2022 included a paper from Police Scotland. Scottish Government officials understand that COPFS and Police Scotland officials have had further discussions since then.

Public Health Scotland were not involved in discussions around the current proposal for an SDCF.

As of the morning of 1 August 2023 there were 2,275 people on remand. The following table shows the average (median) and longest (maximum) continuous time (expressed in days) spent on remand, by ethnic grouping.

The start date of this collection imposes an upper limit on the continuous time to date spent on remand of 1,225 days. Less than five individuals were at that limit, held under the Extradition Act 2003 (S8).

The intention is that fares policy will be reviewed through the Fair Fares Review and Islands Connectivity Plan. Decisions will be taken on implementation in due course.

Some work had commenced with the commercial operator to consider potential options to put in place a compliant RET scheme, although this work has not progressed as quickly as we would have hoped due to other priorities in supporting ferry services.

Applying RET fares on Scottish Government funded services to the Northern Isles routes has previously been considered as potential high risk of distorting the Pentland Firth market and open to challenge. Further discussion and agreement with commercial operators would be required for this to be a viable option.

The following table shows the average (median) and longest continuous time (expressed in days) spent on remand before transition to the sentenced population or departure, in 2020-21 and 2021-22. Data for 2022-23 is not yet available.

Table 1: Average (median) and Longest (Maximum) Number of Days Spent of Remand

The spending on RET is not recorded separately. Since the start of new Clyde & Hebrides Ferry Service contract in 2016, Transport Scotland pays CalMac Ferries Limited, as the operator, a monthly grant payment which covers costs to operate the network as a whole. This is not broken down by individual routes. Previous evaluations have suggested that RET fares save users around £25m per year compared to pre-RET fares.

Transport Scotland is considering future ferry fares policy as part of the Islands Connectivity Plan alongside our wider Fair Fares Review, which will report by the end of 2023 and recommend a package of measures which can be considered for implementation from 2024-25 and onwards to address the wider issues of cost and availability across all modes of public transport.

Meantime, we are continuing to take action on ferry fares with fares on the Northern Isles and Clyde & Hebrides ferry networks to remain frozen until the end of March 2024.

Any introduction of new RET measures on lifeline ferry services in Scotland would now need to comply with the requirements of the Subsidy Control Act 2022 and there have been extensive discussions on the Subsidy Control Act 2022 but no separate specific discussions on RET with the UK Government.