Seòmar agus comataidhean

There could be a traffic-light system to show that something has happened, like we in the committee do with reports.

On 31 January, you told the Parliament that

“The SPS was, of course, aware of ministers’ views—it would be, frankly, bizarre if the SPS had not been aware of ministers’ views”.—[Official Report, 31 January 2023; c 16-17.]

You said that in relation to the decision to remove the prisoner from the female estate. How exactly were those views made known?

I support Jamie Greene’s motion and agree with his comments, and indeed, Katy Clark’s comments about there being a missed opportunity in relation to victim involvement in and contribution to Parole Board hearings, but I have nothing in particular to add to that.

My interest lies in Suzanne’s law, which I have had an interest in for a number of years. I happen to have been a witness in the trial on the murder of Margaret Fleming, whose remains have never been recovered and whose two convicted killers have shown no signs of disclosing where they are. Such situations are appalling for families to live with: killers exercise their on-going power, which causes relentless retraumatisation of families who would desperately like to have closure.

In December of last year, I became aware of a BBC news report—and other news reports—about the Scottish Government apparently bringing in Suzanne’s law. The BBC report said:

“A change to Scotland’s parole rules could mean that killers are denied release if they do not say where, and how, they disposed of victim’s remains.”

I was delighted because that seemed like good news, and it sounded as though what all of the families and campaigners have been calling for was coming to pass. However, when we saw the new rules, it became apparent that their content fell significantly short of the publicity that was generated by them. That is no criticism of the BBC or other media; I think that they were presented with the information in a certain way.

I have been in contact with the family of Arlene Fraser, who was murdered in 1998. Her killer is in custody. Her remains have never been found, and her family understandably supports Suzanne’s law. When I saw the SSI, I pointed out to the family that what was reported about it was not the reality. I received a response back from Arlene’s sister, who said:

“To be honest, I was quite disappointed.”

That was a direct—and quite understated—quote.

It is worth pointing out that when such headlines are generated—perhaps through a Scottish Government press release—it can give false hope to families and further retraumatise them. It might give the impression that Suzanne’s law is coming into being, when in fact it is not.

I thank Jamie Greene for lodging the motion because as a result, John Watt has provided the committee with a very detailed and honest take on the situation. He said that, in essence, for failure to disclose to be “a determinative factor” in consideration of release, a change to the Prisoners and Criminal Proceedings (Scotland) Act 1993 would be required.

I am disappointed to hear the cabinet secretary say that he has no intent of passing Suzanne’s law by revisiting that 1993 legislation, but I look forward to working with Jamie Greene to see whether there is a way to introduce some provision that is ECHR compliant. The issue has arisen in other jurisdictions in the UK; there is Suzanne’s law in Scotland, and there are various other laws elsewhere in the UK, which have all taken the names of female victims, because in almost all these cases, the victims are female.

Jamie Greene’s motion has been fantastic in flushing out the truth of the matter, however, I am not minded to vote for it. I am not sure whether he intends to press the motion, but that is obviously up to him. We do not want to throw the baby out with the bath water, but it has been a useful exercise to find out the truth.

“Residential rehabilitation”, which starts on page 7 and ends on page 9, mentions a variety of funding. Audit Scotland talked about that recently, saying in essence that there is a lack of clarity around how that money is being spent. Given that lack of clarity, there is a lack of ability to evaluate the effectiveness of that spending. I do not know whether that is the place for that point, or whether there is somewhere further on where it would be more relevant, but it is worth making.

This is just a small point. Page 13 makes reference to

“the Scottish Sentencing Council’s recently published guidelines for sentencing young people.”

I think that it would be better to be a bit more specific, perhaps by including a link. It should say the date when those guidelines were published and when they were brought into effect, because I am not entirely sure when that was.

In the letter that we send, could we perhaps ask for some more data? When we had a police witness before us, we asked about the number of officer suicides. He said that he would come back to us, but he has not done so. We have since corresponded with the police, but they have shown no sign of providing that information. Therefore, I suggest that we ask specifically for that information, and that we ask how many of those officers were subject to on-going internal processes.

I would also like to know, in the light of the fact that we have raised the matter publicly and in writing with the SPA and Police Scotland, whether they have revisited the SPA’s acceptance that there is

“nothing to see here”,

when, in fact, it is clear that there is something to see.

Ellie Wilson is a rape victim who has been very vocal, and has been campaigning, on this subject. I declare an interest, as she used to work for me. In the past couple of days, she has made it known that she has now acquired some of the transcripts that she was seeking, but she had to resort to crowdfunding to make that affordable. I do not know what the costs were, but I think, from what the committee learned previously, that they were quite significant.

In the response from Keith Brown, there is at least some acknowledgement that this is an important and serious issue. One could be cynical and say that putting information on a webpage to explain that there is a process is not great progress, but it is progress. It shows that people have somewhere to begin.

Keith Brown talks about the potential route of making a subject access request as opposed to seeking a full transcript; I do not know how that would work in practice. He also talks about exploring new technology. I assume that he means software that transcribes automatically, which I have used; it is perhaps not as good as it will ultimately be. It has been talked about and considered, but where we go next, I am not entirely sure.

But if this goes to the heart of—

We have very little time.

I echo what the cabinet secretary said: we are not suggesting that trans women inherently pose some kind of threat. The issue has always been about predatory men exploiting gender self-identification. Indeed, that is why we are here to talk about this particular case.

A victim of this male-bodied double rapist—and his wife—has said that his claim to be trans is a “sham”. Cabinet secretary, you told the BBC that, in this case, you need to accept that people identify as women. Nicola Sturgeon has repeatedly been unable to answer this particular question in relation to this individual. Kate Forbes has said:

“No rapist can be a woman. Isla Bryson is a man”.

Who is right?