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It seems that we in Scotland have been rather slow to deal with the evolution of criminology in things such as sobriety tagging and GPS technology. Do you understand that an element of society, including some of the victims organisations that often deal with legislators, feels some unease at some of those suggestions? For example, there is unease about emergency legislation that releases people from prison early, because it feels as though justice has not been served. There is also unease about directing the judiciary as to what it should and should not do and who can and cannot go to prison. How should legislators balance that unease among victims and the wider public, who might fear for their safety, with the perilous situation in prisons? Is it at tipping point?

I can tell.

Of course, much of that comes from the top down. In the first section of your briefing, you immediately identify—I do not want to put words in your mouth—a lack of political leadership overseeing much of the strategy as being an issue. You specifically identify that the

“Economic Leadership Group has not yet been established.”

The strategy was published two years ago. Are you surprised about that?

Indeed.

It does. Thank you.

That reflects the complexity of our respective roles in this area: on the one hand, using public money and Government intervention in certain areas in which the Government chooses to do so; and, on the other, using that as leverage to improve the wider economic outlook in the private sector, in which small and medium-sized businesses, for example, are part of the solution.

I want to touch on the very short mention that is made, on page 14 of your briefing, of the new deal for business that the Scottish Government has touted. Would you say that it is facing a bit of an uphill struggle with that? Last year, independent analysis by commentators such as the Fraser of Allander Institute predicted a less than favourable outlook for that relationship. By August of last year, the Fraser of Allander Institute was saying that only 9 per cent of Scottish businesses believed that the Government understood the business environment that they worked in. In certain sectors, such as hospitality, construction and professional services, there was a huge differential. Between 50 and 90 per cent of businesses there believed that the Scottish Government did not understand their environment.

That is the backdrop that the Government is up against, and that is the uphill struggle that it faces. It is very early to tell, but is there any evidence that the new deal for business is working or has been reset?

Good morning. I think that other members will probably want to talk about the prison transport issue later in the session, but I want to kick off this morning by looking at the bigger picture with regard to the prison population, capacity within the prison estate, and the state of the estate itself.

The forecast for March 2024 was that the prison population would rise to more than 8,000. I presume that that has occurred. It is my understanding that, even running at maximum capacity and at so-called extended operating capacity, we can accommodate no more than about 8,500 prisoners across the entire estate, so we are getting to a crunch point. Given your overarching brief, what is your view of the situation at the moment? How perilous is it?

It is important that we put on record our thanks to those on the front line who deal with and manage this. It sounds like a real balancing act in some of those institutions.

That said, we have made legislative changes over the past decade. The presumption against short sentences of incarceration means that, by the very nature of our system, those who get sent to prison have been convicted of quite serious crimes. How can we achieve that balance? Do we reduce the prison population, as has been suggested, or is the answer to simply build more estate? We have not been building or replacing those antiquated buildings in a timeous fashion, and any attempts to do so have, as we know, gone massively over budget and been hugely delayed.

What is the answer? Should we be building more prisons or putting fewer people in jail—or both?

Do you have any powers to direct it to be closed if you are unhappy with the conditions?