Chamber and committees

Do you have an approximate gender breakdown of the people whom you help? What is the male to female ratio?

That is correct.

Thank you so much for coming back to me on that. It is much appreciated.

Professor Lesley McAra and other witnesses have talked about the reasons why that should happen, and why it may not be happening, and I agree with them. We have also talked about the provision of secure care; I would like to explore secure care in general as an alternative to incarceration in prisons or in young offenders institutions. The witnesses will probably have heard Bruce Adamson’s powerful evidence in the round-table session earlier. He said that children should never be in prison—I agree with that, and I suspect that others do too.

The submissions from Fiona Dyer and Ashley Cameron express great concern about that, and point out that those settings are not appropriate for children. They certainly do not reflect the recommendations in “The Promise” report or the whole-system approach, nor do they fit in with the getting it right for every child agenda. We know that there can often be tragic outcomes for children in those settings.

Ashley Cameron, you made a powerful submission. Secure care can offer a holistic setting with trauma-informed care and can provide training for young people. What are your thoughts on that? Fiona Dyer and Diane Dobbie have both said that there are legislative barriers to the use of secure care. I would like to tease that out a wee bit.

I completely agree.

I put on record how much I agree with what Bruce Adamson said about keeping children out of prison. The situation is clear cut and urgent. I agree on that for all the reasons that he articulated.

My questions are on the number of women prisoners and are directed to Wendy Sinclair-Gieben and Dr Katrina Morrison. It is nearly 10 years since Dame Elish Angiolini’s report on women offenders but we seem to have made little if any progress on the number of women prisoners. Earlier this month, the total female population was 290, including 93 remand prisoners. We know that women are often victims of abuse or have experienced trauma, and we know the disruption that is caused to families. Why are the numbers still so high? Are alternatives to custody not being used enough? Why do we not seem to have made a lot of progress on the matter?

I put it on record that the secure care home in my constituency is excellent. It has trauma-informed care and offers qualifications to young people so that they can go on to positive destinations. I have visited it many times, and the experience that I have had and that I hear that the young people have is very good.

The problem of the lack of uniformity across Scotland in relation to secure care homes has been highlighted. It is great that there are good ones for young people, as there should be, and that some offer holistic care, but that is not commonplace or uniform. I am aware of the cross-border issue that has been mentioned. That is a result of the funding mechanism for secure care homes, which seems to be inappropriate and inadequate. Again, there is no uniformity—secure care homes have to bid for money and some get more than others, which just does not work. We need to look at that issue as a whole.

The secure care home that I have visited is excellent. I agree that the last resort should be to deprive children of their freedom but, as an alternative to prison and young offenders institutions, secure care homes have a place.

Thank you—I agree with that.

That is helpful.

Will you comment briefly on the legislative barrier that you mentioned?