Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government follows the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) Guidance in the planning of vaccine delivery. This evidence based guidance advises that the single greatest risk of mortality from COVID-19 is increasing age, and that the risk increases exponentially with age. Additionally the committee considers frontline health and social care workers who provide direct care to vulnerable people a high priority for vaccination.

The JCVI priority lists represents 99% of the preventable mortality in the United Kingdom from COVID-19 and throughout the delivery of the vaccination programme we will be guided by the clinical expertise of the JCVI, the MHRA, and our own senior clinical advisers.

At this stage in the vaccination programme every vaccine given to one of these groups would be one less vaccine given to an at-risk individual.

The recommendation made by the Inspectorate of Prosecution was that COPFS should work towards a system of notifying all victims of decisions not to prosecute, whether through the use of IT solutions or otherwise. The Inspectorate recognised that that the rights and expectations of victims would require to be balanced with a proportionate response, that notifying all the victims of decisions not to prosecute has resource implications and that IT solutions may assist.

COPFS proactively notifies victims of decisions not to prosecute in all solemn cases and all summary cases within the specified case remit of the COPFS Victim Information and Advice (VIA) service, including Domestic Abuse and Hate Crime. COPFS advises all victims of all decisions not to prosecute on request. COPFS are exploring possible approaches to extending the current notification scheme, including possible IT solutions.

Crimes and offences are grouped in the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland statistics to provide a high level overview. These groups have been chosen in consultation with users. Proceedings and convictions for assaults against emergency workers over the past ten years are currently published in supplementary tables alongside the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland publication. These tables present proceedings and convictions under sections 1, 2, 3, and 5 of the Emergency Workers (Scotland) Act 2005, section 41(1)(a) of the Police (Scotland) Act 1967, and Section 90 of the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012. The latter two acts cover assaults against police officers, although the last also includes obstruction of a police officer. It is possible to further disaggregate proceedings and convictions under Section 90 of the Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 into assaults against officers and obstructing officers.

The supplementary tables can be found under the supporting files tab of the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland 2018-19 publication webpage or directly accessed at the following link:

https://www.gov.scot/binaries/content/documents/govscot/publications/statistics/
2020/03/criminal-proceedings-scotland-2018-19/documents/additional-tables-ewa
-2018-19/additional-tables-ewa-2018-19/govscot%3Adocument/additional-tables-
ewa-2018-19.xlsx

We will publish these tables again alongside the next publication.

Note that the Criminal Proceedings statistics present the numbers of persons proceeded against and convicted, not number of charges. Someone may be convicted of multiple charges in the same case but be counted only once in the conviction statistics. Where the crime is given, this is for the main charge in a proceeding, which is the charge that received the highest penalty or is deemed to be the most serious crime. Therefore some assaults against emergency workers may not appear in the statistics as they were an additional charge to a main charge. Assaults may also be prosecuted under common law of assault, which cannot be distinguished as being against an emergency worker in the Criminal Proceedings statistics.

The Scottish Government are committed to putting victims’ rights at the heart of the criminal justice

The content of the announcement on 12 January specifically related to changes to parole regulations.

Individuals who have joined the Victim Notification Scheme (VNS) are entitled to receive information, under section 16(3) of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2003, when the relevant prisoner is, for the first time, entitled to be considered for temporary release.

Prior to decisions on temporary release being taken, a number of checks are undertaken with the police, community based social workers, health professionals and other agencies. Individuals registered to VNS Part 2 can make written representations to SPS to help inform decisions on whether an individual is suitable for temporary release, and the information they provide can be taken into account when deciding licence conditions for an prisoners’ temporary release. Individuals who make representations should receive a letter back from SPS informing them of any licence conditions that are specific to them.

As of 1 May 2019 victims of life sentenced offenders are now able to make representations in relation to temporary release in person or orally to a member of staff of the SPS. The opportunity to make representations was previously only able to be done in writing.

In 2020-21 £9.8 million of the £18.7 million victims / witness support budget was allocated to a range of victim support organisations.

Victim Support Scotland have local offices in Aberdeen and Dundee. The Rape Crisis Scotland National Advocacy Project also provides advocacy support in two local centres based in the north east in Aberdeen and Dundee.

National organisations such as Victim Support Scotland, Action Against Stalking, Trafficking Awareness Raising Alliance and Migrant Help, are funded to provide support to victims across the whole of Scotland, including the north east.

The agenda for the next Victim Taskforce meeting on 10 March 2021 will include discussion on the catalogue of initiatives.

There are currently no plans to further reduce unpaid work hours given as part of community payback orders (CPOs).

The Community Orders (Coronavirus) (Scotland) Regulations 2021 will, subject to approval by the Scottish Parliament, reduce unpaid work hours imposed in CPOs by 35% for all existing orders, except those imposed for domestic abuse, sexual offences, or stalking.

We expect this will alleviate pressure on justice social work services, increasing available capacity to help ensure that existing orders can be completed within timescales expected by courts, and that any new orders can commence promptly.

However, considerable uncertainty still remains in relation to the pandemic and it is expected that the number of unpaid work hours will rise over the coming months if justice social work capacity remains significantly constrained by necessary public health restrictions while court business resumes.

We will continue to monitor the situation closely in the coming months, particularly with regard to capacity issues, and to work with partner organisations to address any further difficulties arising as a result of backlogs within the criminal justice system. Further action cannot be ruled out while the pandemic continues, but would be only considered if clearly necessary and proportionate in the context of the emergency powers in the Coronavirus (Scotland) Act 2020, and would be subject to approval by the Scottish Parliament.

The victim support budget has provided substantial investment, via health boards, to support forensic medical services, with £2 million per year over 3 years since 2018-19. In 2020-21, funding was provided to further improve health boards’ forensic medical services, including to enhance existing, or to create new, healthcare facilities and to build workforce capacity. More specifically, this funding has contributed to a new forensic medical examination suite in the Borders General Hospital and has supported the recruitment and retention of Gender-Based Violence leads, forensically trained nurses and other essential workforce positions across all 14 territorial boards.

The Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service (SCTS) publishes, on a monthly basis, a workbook that details the throughput of criminal cases and the forecast of outstanding scheduled trials in the High Court, Sheriff Court and Justice of Peace Court. This shows the impact of court restrictions and can be accessed at the following link https://www.scotcourts.gov.uk/about-the-scottish-court-service/scs-news/2021/02/16/monthly-information-on-criminal-case-throughput-for-january-2021