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Official Report: search what was said in Parliament

The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.  

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Dates of parliamentary sessions
  1. Session 1: 12 May 1999 to 31 March 2003
  2. Session 2: 7 May 2003 to 2 April 2007
  3. Session 3: 9 May 2007 to 22 March 2011
  4. Session 4: 11 May 2011 to 23 March 2016
  5. Session 5: 12 May 2016 to 5 May 2021
  6. Current session: 12 May 2021 to 9 January 2025
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Displaying 808 contributions

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Criminal Justice Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 19 January 2022

Katy Clark

[Inaudible.]—which is very sad. However, it is important that the measures are implemented sympathetically, particularly in relation to items of sentimental value. I think that that is a matter on which the committee would want to be kept advised, to satisfy itself that the regulations are being implemented in a way that is sympathetic to individuals who are incarcerated and cut off from their families.

The contacts from families, particularly from children, are incredibly important to that individual. The committee is very concerned about that aspect, so we would want to be kept closely advised on how the measures are being implemented. In particular, we would like to be informed if there were problems and the measures were not working in the way that we understood that they would work.

The committee will be monitoring that issue. We had a full discussion last week. Privately, all committee members expressed concerns about whether the measures would be implemented in that way, as we would expect.

More generally, I think that the committee feels that it needs more information on the scale of drugs in prisons. I hope that, over the coming period, that will be shared with us, along with information about how the regulations will be implemented.

As has been said, mail is only one route that is being used to bring drugs into prison. The problem is a far larger one than that of mail. The committee wants to hear more on that, and expects the Scottish Government and the Scottish Prison Service to provide information to us on that in the coming period.

Criminal Justice Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 12 January 2022

Katy Clark

It is a follow-up on the points that Pauline McNeill raised about mail being opened in front of prisoners.

I would like to get a bit more detail on the extent to which prisoners can see what the mail is. For example, if it was a birthday card, a photograph or a number of photographs, would the prisoner get to see the mail, even if they did not handle it? Obviously, some items of mail have far greater sentimental value than others. What thought has been given to how mail items of more sentimental value might be provided to prisoners? I appreciate that it is relatively early days, so I suspect that how that is being handled might not be consistent at the moment.

I do not know what percentage of items are checked for drugs, but if it is clear that a mail item is not contaminated with drugs and it has sentimental value, there are times when it would be very helpful for the prisoner to be provided with it, whereas with a lot of correspondence, it probably does not really matter whether they get the original. Will you provide a bit more detail on that?

Criminal Justice Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 12 January 2022

Katy Clark

On the point about the prisoner seeing the item, will the prisoner know what the item is and therefore have some opportunity to make representations if it was a particularly important piece of correspondence for them?

Criminal Justice Committee

Prosecution of Violence against Women and Girls

Meeting date: 22 December 2021

Katy Clark

Lord Advocate, you have been very clear in your support for a time-limited pilot of single judge rape trials. Another suggestion has been that there could be more training or support for juries. Have you given any thought to that? What do you think that might look like?

10:30  

Criminal Justice Committee

Prosecution of Violence against Women and Girls

Meeting date: 22 December 2021

Katy Clark

I think that you have already said that changing the not proven verdict could perhaps be linked to other changes in the system. If there were a decision to move to two verdicts, would other changes be essential and, if so, could you outline in more detail what they might be? For example, it has been suggested that there should be a change to jury majorities. Would that be a necessary condition? What other aspects of the justice system would we need to look at, as well as the verdicts, if this were being given live consideration?

Criminal Justice Committee

Prosecution of Violence against Women and Girls

Meeting date: 15 December 2021

Katy Clark

I will be interested to hear from Mr Cowan. The High Court is, obviously, a higher court than the sheriff court. We would not want there to be an impression that the specialist court was a lesser court than the High Court. My understanding is that, depending on how the legislation is constructed, the specialist court would, in effect, be a specialist part of the High Court. Is that fair?

Criminal Justice Committee

Prosecution of Violence against Women and Girls

Meeting date: 15 December 2021

Katy Clark

The minister has already addressed some of what I was going to ask about. To what extent has it been possible to implement any of Lady Dorrian’s recommendations already? You have outlined the future timetable, but has there already been any implementation of the recommendations?

Criminal Justice Committee

Prosecution of Violence against Women and Girls

Meeting date: 15 December 2021

Katy Clark

Yes, of course.

Criminal Justice Committee

Prosecution of Violence against Women and Girls

Meeting date: 15 December 2021

Katy Clark

We know that repeated concerns have been raised about misogynistic and sexist behaviour in Police Scotland and that there have been numerous complaints. We have tried to get more detail about that, but gender-specific information is not available. On the complaints that reached the Police Investigations and Review Commissioner in 2020-21, we understand that only 202 of 279 referrals were investigated at the time of reporting.

If we open the newspapers, we see the Sarah Everard case. Obviously, the detail of that case will lead women to lose trust in the police. According to what is written in the media, there is a very high level of domestic abuse and violence by police officers. Harassment cases have been reported to the police, although we do not know the detail of those cases.

What work is being done to implement the recommendations in the “Independent Review of Complaints Handling, Investigations and Misconduct Issues in Relation to Policing” from November 2020? How will you address the issues that Dame Elish Angiolini raised in that report? What needs to be done? Is there a significant cultural problem within the police that needs to be addressed? If you do not think that there is a cultural problem, how do you explain what is being reported and said?

Criminal Justice Committee

Prosecution of Violence against Women and Girls

Meeting date: 15 December 2021

Katy Clark

Thank you. That is very helpful.