Questions and answers

Question reference: S4W-04814

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 18 January 2012

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people serving sentences of more than four years have been released early in each of the last five years.

I have asked John Ewing, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service, to respond. His response is as follows:

All prisoners are released in accordance with the requirements of current legislation. Prisoners serving determinate sentences of four years or more are considered for parole once they have served half of their sentence. If the parole board does not direct release at that point, the board will consider the case at 12 month intervals until the offender reaches the 2/3 point of their sentence. At this point, the prisoner is automatically released on licence into the community until the sentence end date.

The number of liberations each year of prisoners serving sentences of four years or more can be found in the Scottish Government annual prison statistics bulletins (table 7 for 2008-09 to 2010-11, and tables 13-14 for earlier years). These are available on the Scottish Government website at

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Crime-Justice/PubPrisons.

Question reference: S4W-04813

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 18 January 2012

To ask the Scottish Executive how many people have been released under automatic unconditional early release in each of the last five years.

I have asked John Ewing, Chief Executive of the Scottish Prison Service, to respond. His response is as follows:

The number of liberations under unconditional automatic early release are shown in the following table. Prisoners serving a custodial sentence of four years or more who are released before the end of their sentence are always released on licence. Prisoners serving a sentence under four years are released automatically and unconditionally at the halfway point with the exception of those on extended sentences, sex offenders with sentences of six months or more, or prisoners subject to a Supervised Release Order. These groups are released on licence and are therefore excluded from the table.

Liberations from Prison Under Unconditional Automatic Early Release: 2006-07 to 2010-11

2006-07	12,164
2007-08	10,031
2008-09	8,739
2009-10	8,734
2010-11	8,042

Source: Scottish Government Justice Analytical Services.

Notes:

1. The statistical datasets used by the Scottish Government are derived from the Scottish Prison Service PR2 information management system and are updated and quality assured on an on-going basis. Therefore the figures shown here may differ slightly from those previously published.

2. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the data, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system. While the figures shown have been checked as far as practicable, they should be regarded as approximate and not necessarily accurate to the last whole number shown.

3. Figures include only those prisoners who are liberated into the community. This excludes prisoners who are deceased, deported, in a hospital, transferred cross border, repatriated, liberated on appeal or to immigration authorities. If a prisoner is liberated more than once during the year, they will be counted more than once.

4. Figures exclude liberations from sentences of four years or more, or recorded as having been released on licence or subject to a Supervised Release Order. They also exclude prisoners released on home detention curfew.

Question reference: S4W-04815

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 17 January 2012

The published information for the number of community service orders commenced in each of the years 2006-07 to 2010-11 can be found in Table 1 of the Criminal Justice Social Work Statistics, 2010-11 Statistical Bulletin (row entitled “Total Community Service Orders – excluding POs with requirement of unpaid work”). This table can be found at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/12/19160622/10.

Information for 2011-12 will not be available until publication of the Criminal Justice Social Work Statistics, 2011-12 Statistical Bulletin, planned for release in December 2012. The dates of all Scottish Government Official and National Statistics publications are pre-announced, and the up to date list of future publications can be found at: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Search/Forthcoming.

Question reference: S4W-04806

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 17 January 2012

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it expects the Scottish Police Service to initiate a voluntary redundancy scheme in 2011-12.

Question reference: S4W-04816

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 17 January 2012

Information is published on the number of community service orders that were terminated due to reasons other than successful completion in each of the years 2006-07 to 2010-11. This can be found in Table 1 of the Criminal Justice Social Work Statistics, 2010-11 Statistical Bulletin (row with subheading “Other terminations” under “Terminations of CSOs”). This table is located at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/12/19160622/10.

Information for 2011-12 will not be available until publication of the Criminal Justice Social Work Statistics, 2011-12 Statistical Bulletin, planned for release in December 2012. The dates of all Scottish Government Official and National Statistics publications are pre-announced, and the up to date list of future publications can be found at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Search/Forthcoming.

Question reference: S4W-04819

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 12 January 2012

To ask the Scottish Executive how much it expects that the VAT liability will be of a single (a) police force and (b) fire service.

<>The estimated costs and savings associated with the reform of both the police and fire and rescue services, including potential VAT liabilities, were identified in the Outline Business Cases published in September 2011. These can be found on the Scottish Government’s website for (a) police at http://scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/09/15112608/0 and for (b) fire and rescue at http://scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/09/15153130/0.

Question reference: S4W-04802

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 10 January 2012

To ask the Scottish Executive what recent discussions it has had with the Scottish Court Service regarding future court structures.

Through the Making Justice Work Programme the Scottish Government has had a range of discussions with the Scottish Court Service regarding future court structures. I met Eric McQueen, Executive Director for Field Services on 15 December 2011 to be briefed on the court service’s initial review of the options for future court structures. In addition, Scottish Government officials sit on the future court structures project board which meets regularly, most recently on
14 December 2011.

Allocation of future court business in relation to the High Court circuit and the location of sheriff and jury trails is the responsibility of the independent judiciary and not Scottish ministers. Decisions about the closure of any court locations would be subject to public consultation and, ultimately, parliamentary approval. No decisions have been made at this stage.

Question reference: S4W-04818

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 10 January 2012

Information for 2011-12 will not be available until publication of the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland, 2011-12 Statistical Bulletin. This is due to be published in December 2012.

The dates of all Scottish Government Official and National Statistics publications are pre-announced, and the up to date list of future publications can be found at:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Search/Forthcoming.

The published information for people given a custodial sentence from 2006-07 to 2010-11 can be found in table 7 of the Criminal Proceedings in Scotland, 2010-11 Statistical Bulletin which can be found at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/12/12131605/0.

Question reference: S4W-04811

Asked by: Lewis Macdonald, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Labour
Date lodged: Friday, 23 December 2011
Current Status: Answered by Kenny MacAskill on 10 January 2012

To ask the Scottish Executive how many (a) part-time and (b) full-time (i) judges and (ii) sheriffs the Scottish Court Service employs.

Chamber and committees