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The Scottish Government has awarded grants totalling £2,235,789 from the Coronavirus Resilience and Recovery Fund for Legal Aid (CRRF). Applications from 84 firms and law centres have been approved and 1 grant is pending subject to a recalculation of award, which is now in the process of being concluded.

The total number of applicants who did not meet the criteria for funding is 195 and is broken down into the following categories:

1. The applicant’s legal aid income did not meet the criteria – 22 applications.

2. No shortfall in applicant’s income was calculated compared with casework prior to pandemic, against the criteria for funding – 124 applications.

3. Applicants demonstrated no shortfall in expected fee income, against the criteria for funding, and have been or will be paid other forms of government support in excess of this sum - 49 applications.

Scottish Ministers made a commitment to keep the CRRF under review and have worked in collaboration with the Law Society for Scotland, the Bar Associations and the Scottish Solicitors’ Bar Association on the co-design and eligibility criteria of a new fund.

An announcement by the Scottish Government was made on 4 August 2021 to launch a new £6.7 million in support of the Government’s which aims to deliver a wide range of measures in recognition of the important role in the Justice system of vital legal aid services in Scotland as we emerge and recover from the pandemic.

The Scottish Government recognises the impact that periods of imprisonment, including time on remand, can have on families. That is why we are committed to reducing the use of short-term imprisonment, including remand and increasing the use of community-based interventions.

SPS are committed to ensuring that people in prison are able to maintain contact with their family during their time in custody. The SPS Family Strategy puts families and family contact at the heart of supporting prisoners during their time in custody. The Strategy doesn’t differentiate between convicted or remand prisoners and recognises the positive contribution that close family contact and involvement can make in supporting the reintegration of prisoners back into the community.

SPS support family contact during a person's time in custody - including on remand - in a number of ways. This includes in-cell telephony, letters and family contact through visits. Under the Prison Rules, those remanded have a greater visits entitlement than those convicted. Remand prisoners have the opportunity of access to daily family visits in prisons holding remand prisoners.

The Scottish Government has provided £3.9m in grant funding for Prison Visitors Centres since 2016/17. Visitors Centres provide a range of support for families and work in partnership with other organisations to make referrals to more specialist advice and support services for things including financial support, childcare, housing support and welfare counselling. This is in addition to £138k p.a. provided to Families Outside, an organisation which supports families affected by imprisonment so that they can readily access appropriate information and support at a time they need it.

We will continue to work with partners to develop approaches in this area, learning from those with lived experience.

We recognise the importance of ensuring that support is available to people leaving custody, including those who have served a period on remand, to enable their reintegration. We know that short periods of imprisonment are not effective and don't address the underlying causes of offending and that is why this Government is committed to reducing the use of short sentences and remand.

For those individuals who do serve a period of remand, the Scottish Prison Service have a range of measures in place to support them during their time in custody and on release. This includes an initial induction process which assesses needs including general welfare, mental health and addiction so that support can be put in place for them during their time in custody. This is further supplemented by support for family contact, provision of housing advice (where needed), access to work and wage earning where appropriate and possible and access to social services through prison Links Centres to deal with immediate concerns regarding social issues.

It is recognised that circumstances where individuals are liberated from a period on remand straight from court can be challenging in terms of linking with local services. To support this, SPS have agreed with GEOAmey that they will provide liberation packs to those released at courts (including those who have been held on remand). These information packs are specific to the local area within which the individual is being liberated.

Specifically for women held on remand, the Shine PSP, funded by Scottish Government, provides support in the lead up to their liberation and beyond.

We will continue to work with partners to explore how we can improve support for people leaving remand.

As a general principle, home owners are responsible for work to their own homes to ensure they meet housing standards. However, recognising that some home owners - particularly older and disabled owners on low incomes - may face difficulty in meeting the new standard, we are considering what additional support is required and we will announce our next steps in due course.

The Scottish Government does not hold the requested information. The member may wish to redirect their question to Police Scotland who may have data on specific types of scams and rogue traders.

Criminal justice social work statistics show that there were 16,700 CPOs imposed in 2019-20 and of these, 70% had an unpaid work or other activity requirement. While unpaid work or other activity is the most common requirement imposed by the courts, there are eight other requirements that can be given as part of a CPO.

National criminal justice statistics are published annually which include information on the proportion of CPOs with unpaid work or other activity requirements. While the relevant statistics are monitored and analysed on an ongoing basis, the proportion of requirements imposed is a result of decisions taken by the independent courts.

It is up to the independent sentencing judge to decide the most appropriate sentence, including which requirements are most appropriate, based on all of the circumstances of the case – for example, the nature of the crime, information contained in the criminal justice social work report and what is most likely to prevent the individual from reoffending.

In certain circumstances, the court may consider that an order without an unpaid work requirement is the most appropriate sentence to address the offending behaviour and its causes. This is particularly the case where an individual has more complex risks and needs that need to be addressed and unpaid work may not be suitable.

An order without unpaid work must have supervision and may include specific requirements in relation to treatment of alcohol, drugs or mental health or a programme requirement such as the Caledonian programme. Conduct, residence and compensation requirements can also be imposed.

While the proportion of CPOs with an unpaid work or other activity requirement has declined in recent years, the proportion of orders with supervision requirements has increased over the same period. This suggests the needs and issues to be addressed may be more complex and for some unpaid work will not be suitable or appropriate.

The completion rate for Community Payback Orders (CPOs) has generally been around 70% over the last seven years. This is consistently higher than for the orders they replaced.

There are a range of factors which can influence the likelihood that an order will be successfully completed. In particular, outcomes are likely to be influenced by the nature of the offending behaviour and individuals’ underlying risks and needs. The proportion of orders with an offender supervision requirement rose to 62% in 2019-20, the highest level in the last five years. Greater use of supervision suggests that individuals have more complex and entrenched issues to address and may have greater likelihood of reoffending.

Local authorities are responsible for delivering CPOs and, notwithstanding the factors noted above, we are continuing to work with national and local partners to help ensure orders are implemented as effectively as possible, and that completion rates are as high as they can be. Specifically, effective practice and improvement is supported by:

Community Payback Order Practice Guidance for practitioners

• a programme of scrutiny and assurance work carried out by the Care Inspectorate, funded by Scottish Government
• ongoing training and support from national partners, including Community Justice Scotland, Social Work Scotland, and Scottish Government
• analysis of statistics which are disaggregated by local authority areas, practice support groups organised by Social Work Scotland, area based CPO annual reports and an annual CPO report prepared by Community Justice Scotland

In addition, the Scottish Government has protected record levels of funding with up to £106 million allocated in 2020-21 to local authorities for the delivery of justice social work services. An additional £11.8 million has been provided this year to support justice social work recovery relating to the impact of coronavirus, which had a significant impact on the delivery of CPOs.

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

We welcome the publication of Audit Scotland’s report on community justice, and its intention to carry out further work in this vital area in 2022.

While sentencing decisions in individual cases are a matter for the independent courts, we are committed to encouraging more widespread use of community-based interventions where appropriate. These are often more effective at reducing re-offending, as Audit Scotland sets out, and for keeping our communities safe.

In addition to continued investment in community justice services, which will total more than £117m this year, Parliament agreed in 2019 to extend the presumption against short custodial sentences from 3 to 12 months. Although it is too early to determine the impact of the extension, the use of such sentences has fallen significantly in recent years, with those receiving a sentence of 12 months or less reducing by 13% in the most recent data between 2018-19 and 2019-20, whereas the number of convictions reduced by 4%.

Our firm focus on prevention and effective community interventions has helped see Scotland’s reconviction rate fall to its lowest level since comparable records began more than 20 years ago. We intend to continue building on progress to date, including through a review of the National Strategy for Community Justice, expanding availability of alternatives to custody, and exploring legislative opportunities for a sustainable reduction in the prison population.

We will consider the issues identified by Audit Scotland in its report, including as part of the review and expected refresh of the Community Justice strategy, which we anticipate will be published in 2022 alongside an update Outcomes, Performance and Improvement Framework.