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The Justice Committee’s Inquiry into the Use of Remand in Scotland , published on 24 June 2018, made a number of recommendations including on approaches to reducing the use of remand and alternatives to remand.

The Scottish Government shares the Committee’s view on the value of bail support and supervision. These programmes are aimed at people who would otherwise be held on remand and allow them to be monitored and supervised in the community. Unlike remand, this allows families to stay together and does not adversely impact on employment opportunities or stable housing, which is proven to reduce reoffending.

We have committed through our Programme for Government to issue revised guidance and provide additional funding for supervised and supported bail to ensure that remand is only used where necessary and appropriate.

This additional funding, which will be demand led, will help build capacity and improve the consistent availability for these services when bail and remand decisions are being considered by the court.

The law is clear in that the presumption is in favour of bail unless the court considers remand is necessary for, amongst other reasons, risks to public safety.

Decisions on whether or not to remand an accused person in custody, or grant bail, are a matter for the court within the overall legal framework agreed by parliament.

The Scottish Government’s shift towards more community sentencing has helped bring Scotland’s reconviction rates to a 19-year low.

Local authorities are responsible for delivering community sentences, including ensuring Community Payback Orders (CPOs) are commenced within recommended timescales and completed. The Scottish Government is funding criminal justice social work at record levels, which supports local authorities to deliver robust and effective community sentences. In 2018-19, we increased the additional funding allocated to local authorities for community sentences from £4 million to £5.5 million.

Completion rates for CPOs have increased from 62% in 2006-07 to 67% in 2016-17. The Scottish Government is working with local authorities and partners including Social Work Scotland, Community Justice Scotland and the Care Inspectorate to support further improvements. For example, we have asked the Care Inspectorate to lead on scrutiny and assurance activity of community justice and criminal justice social work in Scotland. Inspections will focus on criminal justice social work services, with an emphasis on CPOs.

The National Outcomes and Standards for Social Work Services in the Criminal Justice System: Community Payback Orders contains guidance on procedures and practice in the implementation of CPOs. The Scottish Government is currently updating this guidance, in collaboration with practitioners and other key stakeholders, in particular in relation to breach and compliance. The revised guidance will be published by early 2019.

Analysis of Criminal Justice Social Work statistics informs the Scottish Government’s engagement with local authorities on performance, and local community justice partnerships help drive improvements in local authority areas. In addition, Community Justice Scotland will lay an annual report in Parliament on the delivery of CPOs across Scotland, based on local authority returns.

As part of our continued activity to prevent knife crime particularly in schools, I was pleased to launch the national tour of the No Knives Better Lives Balisong play on 24 October in Stewarton Academy, East Ayrshire. We have provided additional funding for the delivery of this unique and powerful play and aim to have it seen in schools across all local authorities by the end of March 2019.

An independent team from the Office of the Chief Information Officer carried out a Business Justification review of Police Scotland’s Digital, Data and ICT Programme. The review team provided a delivery confidence assessment of Amber/Green which indicates that, if the programme proceeds as planned, successful delivery appears probable however constant attention will be needed to ensure risks do not materialise into major issues threatening delivery.

All decisions on future funding, including Police Scotland’s Digital, Data and ICT Programme, are being considered as part of the ongoing spending review. Ministers will outline their plans through the draft budget when it is published later this year.

The Scottish Government’s Mental Health Strategy emphasises the importance of prevention, early intervention and accessible services. We are working with employers across Scotland on how they can act to protect and improve mental health, and support employees experiencing poor mental health. A number of local authorities are providing access to specialist training programmes such as The Hive of Wellbeing which aims to support teacher health and wellbeing.

In respect of Initial Teacher Education programmes, the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) requires universities to outline the variety of pastoral support strategies in place for student teachers while attending university and while on professional placement, to ensure their wellbeing and progress towards successful completion of the programme. In addition, the suite of Professional Standards managed by the GTCS is currently being revised and I anticipate that mental health of both practitioner and learner to be given greater prominence in revised versions.

There are currently 5 electric vehicle charging points at Scottish fire stations to support the Scottish Fire and Rescue Services' electric vehicle fleet. The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service has applied for Scottish Government funding to install a large number of public EV chargers network at fire stations across the country.

In Programme for Government we have committed to improve clinical IT systems in prisons to make services safer and more efficient. The first stage of this is to ensure the current system (INPS Vision) is used fully and consistently across the prison estate. This first stage of work will include analysis of how the system in prisons interface with the Prison Service system as well as a wide range of NHS IT systems and develop approaches for improvement.

Replacing INPS Vision with an improved system will be conducted through the wider GP IT reprovisioning programme. The contracts have not yet been awarded and as a result we do not hold the costing for this.

The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) assesses the performance of each college in its regional context using a range of statistical performance data and qualitative information – including the Outcome Agreement targets and national performance measures. This assessment is then published and provides colleges comparative information on their progress.

SFC and Education Scotland also use the How Good is our College framework, which is the framework against which all colleges self-assess the quality of learning and the student experience - these are validated independently by Education Scotland and SFC. This approach requires colleges to reflect on progress against Outcome Agreement targets as well as quality.

Starting this year, Colleges will also be required to grade their own performance and these grades will be assessed, endorsed (or not) and published by Education Scotland and SFC.

In the current challenging fiscal environment, the Government cannot commit to levels of additional funding on top of the already significant increase provided to colleges in 2018-19 to meet the additional costs of staff harmonisation. The current method of funding national bargaining is the most cost effective way of covering these costs in the transition period while national bargaining is implemented.

As part of our youth employment strategy Developing the Young Workforce we will continue to invest in skills, training and employability to meet the needs of our young people, employers and economy.

In line with the recommendations of the Wood Commission we are committed to the expansion of Foundation Apprenticeships which are already being introduced across Scotland. There are therefore currently no plans to introduce T-Levels in Scotland.