Chamber and committees

No information has been formally received by Scottish Government regarding how much material shortages and increased contractor prices in the construction sector are impacting householders redeeming Home Energy Scotland Loan offers.

The Scottish Government has committed to dedicate £100 million funding, of the £180 million Emerging Energy Technologies Fund, to accelerate the development of the hydrogen economy in Scotland over the next five years and support the realisation of our ambition for 5GW installed hydrogen production capacity by 2030. More details on the proposed design and scope of the Fund will be published alongside the Hydrogen Action Plan later this year.

The Private Rented Sector Landlord (PRSL) Loan was launched in April 2020. The following table shows the total number of applications received, the total number of offers made and the total number of expired offers. These figures represent the total number from launch to the end of June 2021, and relate to the location of the applicant.

The Scottish Government is committed to working closely with local authorities on the shared national endeavour to tackle the global climate emergency by achieving net zero emissions by 2045, recognising that local climate action is crucial to achieving our national climate ambitions.

Through the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019, we have provided new powers for local authorities to introduce Low Emission Zones to improve air quality. We are also providing other forms of support to local government including the Green Growth Accelerator which will unlock £200m of investment in local authorities for emissions reduction infrastructure, and supporting local authorities to develop Local Heat and Energy Efficiency Strategies and accompanying delivery plans.

More broadly, the joint Local Governance Review with COSLA is considering how powers and resources are shared between national and local government, to ensure that we are doing all we can to achieve our shared national outcomes.

The information requested is not held centrally and is a matter for the Parole Board for Scotland.

The Scottish Government does not hold this data. However, information is published annually in the Standards of Service for Victims and Witnesses Annual Report. For the past three years where information is available the number of in-person representations that were made is as follows:

2020-2021* 16

2019-2020* 27

2018-2019 18

*Due to Covid restrictions some meetings have been held remotely.

The Scottish Government does not hold the data requested.

The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service is responsible for issuing Victim Notification Scheme packs. They have advised that the number of packs issued over the last 3 years is:

2018-19 1,880

2019-20 1,788

2020-21 1,158

Eligible victims can register for the scheme at any time. The Scottish Prison Service have advised that the numbers of victims who have opted to register for the scheme in the last 3 years, are as follows:

2018-19 443

2019-20 472

2020-21 306

The most recent reconviction rates show that 29% of people with a Community Payback Order (CPO) imposed in 2017-18 were reconvicted within a year, which is the lowest rate since they were introduced. These statistics are not typically broken down in regard to different requirements within CPOs such as unpaid work or supervision. However, Justice Analytical Services published ‘Community Payback Orders: What the Unit Level Data Tells Us So Far’ in February 2020 which found that the reconviction rate for those given unpaid work between 2012-13 and 2014-15 was 33% where this was accompanied by justice social work supervision, and 27% where it was not. These figures compare with 41% for those given orders with no unpaid work. While no conclusions can be drawn about the impact of unpaid work on offending behaviour, this may suggest that individuals who do not have unpaid work imposed are likely to have more complex and entrenched issues to address and may have greater likelihood of reoffending.

Overall, CPOs are an important aspect of a sustained focus on prevention and effective community interventions which has helped see Scotland’s reconviction rate fall to its lowest level since comparable records began more than 20 years ago.

CPOs offer opportunities for rehabilitation by requiring individuals to tackle the underlying causes of their offending behaviour. They also deliver real benefits to communities, and while capacity to deliver unpaid work has been significantly impacted by the coronavirus pandemic, around 9 million hours of unpaid work have been carried out since CPOs were introduced.

The Victims Taskforce was established in December 2018 to co-ordinate and drive action to improve the experience of victims and witnesses in the criminal justice system - it is not in the Taskforce’s remit to recommend legislative change.

A number of legislative changes have been progressed by the Scottish Government since the inception of the Taskforce that advance or facilitate actions in the Taskforce’s work plan and provide a legislative framework within which further improvements can be made. Examples of primary legislation include the Vulnerable Witnesses (Criminal Evidence) (Scotland) Act 2019, the Forensic Medical Services (Victims of Sexual Offences) (Scotland) Act 2021 and the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021. Furthermore, various pieces of secondary legislation have seen the implementation of the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018, the establishment of the Victim Surcharge Fund, the creation of a statutory Appropriate Adult service, more flexible powers to pilot improvements to the victim statement scheme and changes to Parole Board Rules to ensure victims are better informed, more involved and receive greater support ahead of prison release decisions.

Data is not available at this time on the number of times body worn cameras have been used by Police Scotland as evidence to secure a conviction.

Should the decision be made to rollout the use of body worn cameras to other roles across Police Scotland, a range of data will be gathered to assess the impacts of the rollout including quantative data relating to criminal justice processes.