The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.
The Official Report search offers lots of different ways to find the information you’re looking for. The search is used as a professional tool by researchers and third-party organisations. It is also used by members of the public who may have less parliamentary awareness. This means it needs to provide the ability to run complex searches, and the ability to browse reports or perform a simple keyword search.
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
Depending on the kind of search you want to do, one of these views will be the best option. The default view is to show the report for each meeting of Parliament or a committee. For a simple keyword search, the results will be shown by item of business.
When you choose to search by a particular MSP, the results returned will show each spoken contribution in Parliament or a committee, ordered by date with the most recent contributions first. This will usually return a lot of results, but you can refine your search by keyword, date and/or by meeting (committee or Chamber business).
We’ve chosen to display the entirety of each MSP’s contribution in the search results. This is intended to reduce the number of times that users need to click into an actual report to get the information that they’re looking for, but in some cases it can lead to very short contributions (“Yes.”) or very long ones (Ministerial statements, for example.) We’ll keep this under review and get feedback from users on whether this approach best meets their needs.
There are two types of keyword search:
If you select an MSP’s name from the dropdown menu, and add a phrase in quotation marks to the keyword field, then the search will return only examples of when the MSP said those exact words. You can further refine this search by adding a date range or selecting a particular committee or Meeting of the Parliament.
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
There are two ways of searching by date.
You can either use the Start date and End date options to run a search across a particular date range. For example, you may know that a particular subject was discussed at some point in the last few weeks and choose a date range to reflect that.
Alternatively, you can use one of the pre-defined date ranges under “Select a time period”. These are:
If you search by an individual session, the list of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and committees will automatically update to show only the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and committees will update to show the information that was current at that time.
All Official Reports of meetings in the Debating Chamber of the Scottish Parliament.
All Official Reports of public meetings of committees.
Displaying 1121 contributions
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Angela Constance
I acknowledge that there is a debate around that. In many ways, it is a live debate between different stakeholders and voices in the legal establishment. I certainly acknowledge that uncertainty for victims is undesirable.
The Government’s position is that we are supportive of reducing the use of floating trials. We have not introduced any measures to ban their use; in essence, that is because we are still tackling a court backlog.
Although the court recovery programme is making good progress and has reduced the backlog by a third, and there is a timetable of activity to move matters forward, the concern is that removing floating trials at this time could increase delays further and induce further distress.
We have taken a more flexible approach whereby courts would be required to consider trauma-informed practice when scheduling their business. However, we are supportive of a shift in culture.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Angela Constance
With respect, I point to Lady Dorrian’s review of the management of sexual offence cases, from which the bill is largely developed. That took a clean-sheet approach and it was a substantive piece of work that took place over two years.
It is always fair to acknowledge that no bit of legislation is ever the silver bullet but, although it does not come without its financial costs, this is a substantial piece of legislation that will make historic changes that will benefit victims and witnesses and, crucially, improve the experience that victims and witnesses have of our current court procedures in particular.
11:00Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Angela Constance
The chief superintendent was talking about a local policing context and working with community planning partnerships, and he was reflecting on matters at a level beyond the bill; I am not sure that he was giving a direct comment that was specifically about the bill. However, members who were present at the time will have their own views on that.
Having looked at the Official Report, Mr Findlay, and at your lengthy exchange with Mr Watt about the Parole Board, my understanding is that some of what he said was quite specific to how the Parole Board engages with victims or those who are registered under the victim notification scheme.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Angela Constance
We are riding two horses at once—
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 15 November 2023
Angela Constance
That is sometimes just the way that life needs to be. We are taking this bill through Parliament in tandem with the work to implement previous legislation.
On some of the specifics, the bill before us expands the powers of the Children (Scotland) Act 2020. There is a good synergy between the 2020 act and this bill, in that we are essentially increasing the safeguards for vulnerable parties. Section 11 of the 2020 act contains special measures that are focused on family cases involving custody and disputes about contact. In this bill, we are taking the nub of that element and expanding it to cover civil procedures more widely. That is to be welcomed—it is what victims have been calling for.
Nonetheless, I would say that progress has been made with the 2020 act. There are other aspects of that act that do not relate directly to this bill—in and around child contact centres, for example. Ministers have had detailed discussions with the Care Inspectorate on that and hope to be in a position to lay Scottish statutory instruments soon. There is progress on that.
The bit of the 2020 act that is relevant to the bill that is before us is a good example of where we have undertaken a bit of movement in protecting people in civil proceedings and expanded that further, and we will make more progress in that respect.
The Vulnerable Witnesses (Criminal Evidence) (Scotland) Act 2019 relates to the introduction of pre-recorded evidence in court, and we have made progress in that regard in the High Court. That work is phased and on-going. In later sessions, we will discuss part 5 of this bill, on the establishment of a sexual offences court, and there will be a presumption that pre-recorded evidence will be used in that court.
11:30The Domestic Abuse (Protection) (Scotland) Act 2021 is an example of legislation for which there are practical issues relating to implementation. That is why I gave a note of caution in our discussion about amendments. Not all the issues with the 2021 act relate to finances. Some relate to how timescales that are set in legislation have an impact on the operational justice agencies, and there are some challenges in how the views of children can be gathered in ways that do not cause them additional harm or trauma. This is in no way an excuse, but our experiences in implementing the 2021 act are not dissimilar to some of the difficulties that have been experienced south of the border.
Legislation can be complex, and its implementation is sometimes more complex than anticipated. However, I assure the committee that I will seek to mitigate such issues as far as possible as we go through the bill process.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Angela Constance
There is an alignment between the justice vision and the national strategy for community justice, and the delivery plans in that respect. There is nothing new in the delivery plans, but they are continuing to put our words into practice. I would also highlight the transformational change programme, particularly the way in which it shifts the balance from prison to community justice.
The overall community justice budget for this year is £134 million, which includes the continuation of an additional £15 million of investment that began in 2022-23 to support pandemic recovery efforts and to bolster capacity. However, there is no doubt that the early intervention that we want to see in justice services applies beyond those services. The Government’s broader agenda in relation to early intervention and prevention, whether in health, early years, social security, employability and so on, is crucial, too. I do agree, though, that there is a very strong argument for picking up the pace in achieving our ambitions for community justice, bearing in mind the situation that we are in with a growing prison population.
11:00Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Angela Constance
To be blunt, I would say that doing nothing to move towards preventative services and early intervention is not an option. Indeed, we can see that in the obvious example of the rising prison population, and the same could apply to other justice services. In our broad strategic approach, we need to reduce demand for some services, and you can do that only by acting earlier.
With our precious resources, we need, where possible, to have a longer-term spend-to-save vision through, for example, certain digital investment. The evidence tells us that, although there will always be a place for prisons and although there will always be people who will be required to be in custody, the use of robust community supervision is far more effective at reducing reoffending than, for example, a short-term custodial sentence. In some circumstances, prison is an expensive way of making things worse.
I think that your cross-Government point is well understood; indeed, I would highlight as an example the overrepresentation of care leavers in our prison system. Therefore, it is not just investment in community justice or rehabilitation programmes in prisons that is important to me, but our investment in the early years, in supporting families and in the Promise, and there is also the work that we are doing in justice on the bairns’ hoose pathways. All of those things will lead to a different approach to supporting children and victims.
Moreover, there is the proceeds of crime money that is invested in diversionary activities for young people. Over its history, it has supported hundreds of thousands of them; indeed, I think that the current programme will benefit around 33,000 young people across the country.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Angela Constance
How the Lord Advocate pursues prosecutions is a matter for her. I will have meetings and catch-up sessions with the Lord Advocate and it will be for her to perhaps look at modelling to anticipate the impact that that will have on prosecutions. However, as I said, the judgment has an immediate and retrospective impact.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Angela Constance
It is too early to say, but I think that it is fair to say that it has the potential to increase prosecutions.
Criminal Justice Committee
Meeting date: 8 November 2023
Angela Constance
Yes. I did not want you to be under the impression that this was a one-year-only capital investment.