Chamber and committees

The monitoring and supervision of people on parole is the responsibility of Criminal Justice Social Work (CJSW) departments and is met from the annual Scottish Government allocation of grant funding for CJSW to each local authority.

The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) is committed to improving the way that sexual offences are investigated and prosecuted, and to reduce the time which it takes for all cases involving serious sexual offences, including rape, to progress through the criminal justice system.

The Scottish Government has allocated additional funding to COPFS, among other things, to facilitate improvement in the overall journey times of High Court sexual offence cases. COPFS has formulated a programme of work to that end. The implementation of that programme of work is dependent on the recruitment and training of additional staff.

The additional funding will allow COPFS to recruit 25 additional staff to work on High Court Sexual Offences cases. 15.5 of those posts have been filled, 3 posts have new post-holders identified to take up post in the next few weeks and the remaining 6.5 posts are subject to ongoing recruitment processes. The new staff who have already taken up their posts are now undertaking a period of training and induction within the national High Court Sexual Offences team.

Once the new staff are in place, new processes will be implemented with a view to earlier indictment of new cases whilst also managing the existing caseload. It is anticipated that it will take about 18 months from receipt of the additional resource to a new model of performance, which fully meets the ambitions of the COPFS programme of work, though it is expected that incremental improvements will become apparent during this time.

One of the factors identified by the Inspectorate of Prosecution as a significant contributor to the delay in overall journey times of High Court sexual offence cases was the use of pre-petition investigation. In October 2016 there were approximately 700 cases which were subject to pre-petition investigation. A significant programme of work has been undertaken to address this, and there are now fewer than 100 cases under pre-petition investigation.

With effect from June 2019, the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service will introduce two additional trial courts for High Court business, thus providing additional capacity for the throughput of cases.

In December 2018, Her Majesty’s Inspection of Constabulary in Scotland (HMICS) published a progress review of recommendations it had made in March 2017, to improve forensic medical examination services for victims of sexual crime. The Chief Medical Officer for Scotland chairs a multi-agency Taskforce to provide national leadership for the improvement of these services.

Healthcare Improvement Scotland Standards published in December 2017, provide for people to request the gender of forensic physician involved in their care. A key Taskforce priority is to support Health boards to ensure that this choice can be met consistently throughout Scotland.

The Scottish Government funded NHS Education Scotland in 2018-19 to deliver training in forensic medical examinations for victims of rape and sexual assault, with the aim of increasing the number of female physicians who are able to undertake this work. Of the doctors who have already completed this training the majority are women.

Two national champions have also been appointed by NES to mentor and support trainees, and to consider how more clinicians - including women - can be recruited and retained to work in this area.

Suppliers are not required to publish a Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement within the current financial year. Section 54 of the Modern Slavery Act states that a commercial organisation must prepare a slavery and human trafficking statement for each financial year of the organisation but does not say when that statement must be published. The UK Government produced additional guidance to accompany the Act which states that “Organisations should publish their statement as soon as possible after their financial year end. We expect this to be, at most, within six months of the organisation’s financial year end."

Of the 125 unique suppliers that have an annual turnover of £36m or more, all of them have either provided a copy of their Slavery and Human Trafficking Statement or identified one on their website which complies with Section 54 of the Modern Slavery Act and the accompanying guidance. Statements are reviewed on an ongoing basis depending on the timing of the requirements to publish which can vary from supplier to supplier.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-21227 on 26 February 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-21229 on 26 February 2019. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx .

Ten out of fourteen NHS Boards, including larger Boards, already offer early medical abortion at home (EMAH) to those patients for whom it is clinically appropriate. Some other Boards are currently preparing to offer EMAH.

Electronic signatures can be used where appropriate, as long as NHS Boards comply with the requirements of the Abortion (Scotland) Regulations 1991.

The Scottish Government welcomes collaborative working by NHS Boards. In particular, the island NHS Boards work closely with NHS Grampian, NHS Highlands , and NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde to provide services for their patients.

The Scottish Government has no plans to amend legislation regarding early medical abortions.