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Absolutely. As I mentioned earlier, each child’s care, even within a secure care centre, is dealt with on a case-by-case basis. It is defined by the child and the support that they need. Secure accommodation centres already utilise a range of interventions and strategies to meet the needs of all children, to ensure that their safety is maintained and that risk is managed. That is important in relation to the member’s comments about the most serious offences.

Risk assessment and risk management frameworks allow for decisions about the level of care, the supervision and the restrictions on a child to be bespoke, proportionate and tailored to the needs of that child—that is what I was referring to when I mentioned dealing with things on a case-by-case-basis. That is to ensure both their safety and the safety of others in the secure centre.

We have no plans to change that or to separate children who are placed in secure care on the basis of considerations such as their route into secure care, their age or the offence type. Yes, we will listen, and we will work with those who are involved, and we will continue to monitor the issue as we go forward.

We need to recognise the wider backdrop to the issue. Over time, there will be a saving for society and for public expenditure. As I said, the financial memorandum sets out the headline cost and was produced via in-depth engagement with partners and duty bearers. As my officials have pointed out, given the nature of care and justice services, there is a high degree of variability, so it can be difficult to forecast. The Scottish Government wanted to avoid underestimating in many areas, and obviously there are significant financial implications. As I said, it is important to recognise the wider backdrop of the benefits that the change programmes could have for our society and for public expenditure.

I think that you had another question tacked on to that.

A range of measures are under way, and that point is under consideration. Secure care is more appropriate for 16 and 17-year-olds, as I have mentioned. The environment is age appropriate and child centred, with focused work to address the child’s specific behaviours. As I have said, a therapeutic and educational setting can help to lead children to healthier development and better outcomes, and it can decrease the likelihood of future offending.

Secure care is the right setting to better support children who require to be deprived of their liberty in order to address their underlying needs and the causes of their behaviours and to help them to reintegrate, to recover, to rehabilitate and to desist. That, in turn, will reduce the number of future victims and will benefit society as a whole.

Children are not mini-adults. A child’s propensity to alter their behaviour and change their path can be far greater than that of adults, as I have already mentioned this morning. Safe and trusting relationships are the absolute cornerstone of promoting children’s healthy development and positive outcomes. Through the provision of 24/7 care, the relationships that secure care staff can provide are absolutely key. That was something that the member mentioned specifically. The knowledge, skills, training and ratios of staff—there are often two staff per child—are supportive of the development of such relationships.

Staff in secure care centres must be registered and qualified in relation to care and education. The care-based, child-centred ethos and environment that secure care affords are supported by the centres, which are registered, monitored and inspected by the Care Inspectorate and Education Scotland.

I hope that that goes some way towards answering the member’s question.

No—that would be its opinion.

On the support for social work, I will hand over to my official, who might give a clearer response on that.

Further to the Age of Criminal Responsibility (Scotland) Act 2019, in February, we published a list of places of safety. Each local authority identified its own resources areas, which included foster care and children’s houses. Therefore, that work is already under way.

I had a feeling about it.

Thank you for that question. Obviously, that is looking to the future, and, as you rightly said, the bill focuses on under-18s, and that is because that is in line with the UNCRC. However, we absolutely recognise that people under the age of 25 are still developing. In many areas, Scotland has and is still developing a very distinct approach to young people between the ages of 18 and 25. However, at the moment, the considerations for under-18s are very different, particularly in terms of rights. For example, the bill makes provision for young people to remain in secure care until they are 19 if they have been sentenced or remanded before the age of 18. That will be possible only when that approach is not contrary to the best interests of other children.

I will come back to your question. When we look at young adults over the age of 18, we see that the number of people and the offences that would be affected by a different approach massively increases, as you have seen from the numbers of those who would be in secure care who are currently in YOIs.

I know that witnesses have been broadly supportive of the bill being a starting point and looking beyond the age of 18. We are also mindful of the Sheriff Mackie hearings system working group on redesign of the children’s hearings system, which is yet to report. Those wider developments will provide us with an evidence base and valuable learning, and we can certainly look to that in the future. At the moment, young offenders institutions will continue to provide custodial facilities for young people up to the age of 23, but I absolutely take your point that we need to consider this in the future.

Yes.

It is of the utmost importance that we ensure that an inappropriate or unsafe person is not contacted. Under the bill’s provisions, when a child is in police custody, their parent must be informed if the child is under 16, and, as the member rightly stated, if the child is aged 16 or 17, an adult reasonably named by the child must be contacted.

Existing safeguards enable an appropriate constable to delay sending intimation for various reasons, including if the intimation is deemed necessary to safeguard and promote the wellbeing of the child in custody. The local authority will always be notified if a child under 18 is in police custody and can advise a constable that the person to whom the intimation is to be sent—that is, a parent or another adult—should not be contacted. The local authority can also give advice as to who might be an appropriate person to contact. The constable must have contact with that advice. Access of a parent or another adult to the child can also be refused or restricted if the constable believes that that is necessary to safeguard and promote the wellbeing of the child in custody.

The bill therefore takes account of that issue.