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I contend that the legislation does have a degree of specificity around trauma-informed practice. We need to recognise the context in which it will be applied. We often discuss in committee debates how much detail the Parliament wants to put in the bill and how much scope we want to leave for those who have to implement the bill in practice.

On the more general point, I contend that victims’ interests are woven throughout the bill. At its core, every part of the bill is about improving victims’ experience when they are in contact with the criminal justice system, because we recognise that people often become involved as complainers at a time of trauma. The bill makes a number of bold but balanced reforms to reflect victims’ experience.

Mr Findlay asked about part 4. I will not reiterate what I said in response to the convener; the jury reforms are not about increasing or decreasing the number of convictions; they are about achieving transparency and commanding the fullest confidence in the administration of justice and all aspects of our justice system.

The substantial independent Scottish jury research, which took place over two years and involved 900 mock jurors, isolated factors so that the researchers could consider our jury system’s unique aspects. The research looked at issues of size and majority and at the impact of moving from three to two verdicts. Unlike many other studies, that study was able to examine the detail of the mock jurors’ deliberations.

It was established that moving from three to two verdicts in isolation could increase the number of convictions so, to ensure the appropriate safeguards and balances in our system, the proposal is to move from a simple majority to a qualified majority, which consultation responses supported.

I have said repeatedly that the reforms to the jury system are not designed to either increase or decrease the number of convictions.

The question about diversity is a fair one. In the interests of balance and fairness, the evidence that the senators of the College of Justice submitted to the committee unsurprisingly includes more than one view. We have known for some time that there is not one view on some of the reforms that have been proposed, particularly in terms of the pilot. For the record, it is important to acknowledge that the submission from the senators narrates that there is support among some senators for that change.

However, the point about diversity is important. The jury research that I referred to earlier demonstrated that the diversity of juries did not overcome the prevalence and power of rape myths. Although Mr Findlay is, of course, right to raise issues about the diversity of the judiciary, nonetheless, the judiciary is a group of professional decision makers who have experience and training, and if they are part of the sexual offences court they will, like everybody else, have to be trained in trauma-informed practice. It is a more easily identifiable group to support with other measures including education and training, which is probably unachievable if you are randomly selecting 12 or 15 people.

It is of no surprise to me that there is a range of views. I have spent the summer engaging with different bar associations and, in particular, criminal defence lawyers. I hope that the committee recognises that I am not a politician who wants only to meet or engage with people who agree with me. From my perspective, that engagement was very helpful in understanding better the nature of their concerns about the pilot and the other stresses and strains that they are currently experiencing in their day-to-day work.

I emphasise that no part of our system is exempt from change, but I recognise that change can be difficult and challenging. Members of the legal profession are entitled to their view—they will be part of that debate—but we have at least a year between the start of stage 1 and stage 3, when we will all vote on the final bill. We need to give one another a bit of time and space, have the debate and try to work together in the interests of our shared common goal. We all want guilty people to be convicted and people who are not guilty to walk free, and we all want complainers’ experience of our court system to be better.

I would describe the journey that we are on as more of a marathon than a sprint.

I will add to that briefly. I hope that this will get us to the nub of Mr Findlay’s question. In the current system, there is no data on what individual jury members opt for as a result of their decision making and there is no other system that has moved from three verdicts to two verdicts, because no other system has three verdicts. That means that some of the hypotheses that Mr Findlay has—understandably—questioned have no data, because we do not have a crystal ball. However, it is the overall balance and integrity of the system that are crucial.

Yes, that is a reasonable summary.

The issue has not turned up in deliberations so far. Mr Swinney is aware that the reforms are built on substantial independent research, but further, intense cross-sector work has also been done to galvanise and build on the experiences of those who work in operational aspects of our justice system.

There was some consideration of other alternatives. Ultimately, although the Lady Dorrian review encompassed a range of opinions, it settled on a pilot for single judge trials in relation to rape and attempted rape cases on the basis that those trials are not novel in Scotland. The majority of criminal cases—I think 84 per cent—are presided over by a single judge, although admittedly those are less serious cases, which are heard in lower courts. The working group that followed Lady Dorrian’s extensive review gave some consideration to whether we could have a shadow verdict system, which would involve having a shadow judge alongside a judge and jury. However, there were considerable ethical issues in and around that, so the approach was not pursued.

Some consideration was given to having more than one judge and having perhaps a panel of judges. However, a practical consideration is that we do not have an endless supply of judges and in a situation where a case was appealed, for example, we would need an even larger number of judges to supply the panel.

There are other models in other jurisdictions. Other jurisdictions have moved away from jury trials for particular cases. Parts of Australia and New Zealand and parts of America, France and Germany have a judge and a panel of lay people, and, if I am correct in my recall, the Netherlands does not use juries. There are different models, but ultimately the recommendation was to consider a single judge pilot on the basis that that model would not be novel in Scotland.

It will be no surprise to anybody on the committee that we are living in fiscally challenging times. I will not go into the causes of that or, indeed, the solutions, because that will be part of a bigger parliamentary budget debate.

The one-off cost of establishing the sexual offences court will be a minimum of £1.4 million and we will be looking at a minimum cost of £500,000 per annum going forward. It is fair to say that those costs might change, depending on the operational decisions that are made about how we go forward with the implementation.

On the timescale, the bill will be passed a year from now—assuming that it is passed—and the measures that will be implemented first, in 2025, are likely to be those that do not require secondary legislation or court rules. Establishing a sexual offences court will require new court rules and procedures. Therefore, we are still a little bit away from achieving the ambitions in and around having a sexual offences court. As with any bill, particularly a large bill, the provisions need to be phased in in order not to overwhelm the system.

I will end on this point, convener—I am surprised that you are not telling me to cut to the chase. The other crucial argument for, and potential benefit of, a sexual offences court is that it could improve efficiency in dealing with the growing number of complex cases. Again, that is something that the Lady Dorrian review looked at. A large part of her work was about what additional measures could assist with the efficiency of cases. Yes, there is still a court recovery programme, but this measure is also an opportunity to deal with those cases more efficiently.