 Iuno-22 fre, of the criminal justice committee. There are no apologies this morning. Please can I ask members to ensure that mobile phones are switched to silent and wait for sound engineers to switch on your microphone before speaking? Our first agenda item today is consideration of the prisons and young offenders' institutions' Scotland Amendment rules of for 2021, and I refer members to paper one. We took evidence on this last week from the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Veterans and from the Scottish Prison Service. We all recognise the balance that needs to be struck between a desire to prevent drugs entering our prisons while at the same time protecting the rights of prisoners. Before I ask whether the committee wishes to report any conclusions to the Parliament, I invite comments from members. If anybody would like to make a comment, please raise your hand or put an R in the chat function. Yes, hello. It's worth just revisiting very quickly some of what brought us to this situation. We had multiple ambulances getting called out to prisons at a time when the NHS was under severe strain, in particular in Lanarkshire. It was at this level black and those prisoners who had overdosed were being treated in intensive care beds in a hospital that was under severe pressure due to Covid. The ambulance service at this point was subject to assistance from the military and the prison officers who have been talking about this drug problem for many months and years were many of them saying that the level of drugs were the highest that they had ever seen in decades. I think that it's just worth reiterating that the need to do something with the mail, given that the main source of drugs into prisons was absolutely vital and necessary and should be welcomed. For all the issues around prisoners' rights, we also need to bear in mind the rights of prison officers and the working environment that they are in. Indeed, the majority of prisoners who want to be in an environment that is not a wash with drugs and that they are not susceptible to falling victim to that culture. All in, it's very important and positive development. I'll hand over to Pauline McNeill. I think that you'd like to come in. Thank you very much, convener. I largely agree with the comment of Russell Findlay that we need to take proportion to the action to roll back the scourge of drugs in our prisons so that we are content that the regulations are necessary. I did raise concerns with the cabinet secretary and the chief executive of the prison service, Theresa Medway, just to give some reassurances around prisoners who might get caught up in the process and questioned what I felt satisfied about was that prisoners would be present if any suspect meal was to go through the process. That gave me some assurances. I always thought that it would be useful to put on the record, convener, that miscarriages of justice organisations module have written to the committee expressing concerns in the act on behalf of convictive prisoners where they feel that there is a credible case. I think that it is important to note that correspondence. I, for one, will be listening out and monitoring the impact of the regulations to make sure that they are proportionate. One of the concerns raised by families outside was that families might stop writing to prisoners because they fear that something would happen to their correspondence for the cards or whatever and where they innocently sent them. I think that, for those reasons, I think that the committee just wants to keep an eye on this going forward, but thank you very much, convener. Thank you very much, Pauline. I will bring in Jamie Greene, followed by Katie Clark. Jamie, over to you. Thank you, convener. Good morning, committee members. I had three brief points to make. The first is in relation to the evidence that we took last week. I did feel at the end of it that we were perhaps none the wiser as to the scale and volume of mail that is being intercepted. There were a number of points raised, which might merit and follow-up writing from either the Scottish Prison Service or the Cabinet Secretary, primarily on the process of mail being intercepted. I think that there might be some miscommunication or confusion in the wider public sphere around what mail is being stopped, what mail is not being passed to prisoners, what mail has been photocopied and what mail is not being read and the process around that where it takes place. I think that that transparency might help to offer some reassurance to the families of those in prison and those who are not quite aware of what the SSI actually means and does in real life. I do appreciate the operational reasons why some information might be sensitive to the sharing public. That was hinted at last week by the Cabinet Secretary. I am fine and content with that and I understand the reasons for that. In that respect, perhaps that might be something that could be shared confidentially with members of the committee, as is the norm with such information. The second point was around the issue that I raised that it is not just physical paper, mail or paper and cards that is soaked in illicit substances. We know that other items are brought in. The question is whether serious organised criminal gangs are no longer to rely on traditional forms of smuggling drugs into paper. How else will the drugs get into prison? I think that we would be naive to think that it is simply going to stop altogether. We know, for example, that in the past, items of clothing that are sent to prisoners or other parcels are pre-soaked in drugs. We also know that over-the-border perimeter methods—the old-fashioned ways, if you like—are starting to see a resurgence. I would be keen if the Government and the SPS would keep us posted on that. The third and final point was about an issue that I tried to raise but ran out of time around digital communication and what alternatives are being offered in email systems. I do not mean mobile telephony but perhaps fixed devices or other forms of electronic communication that will allow families to privately, directly, confidentially, quickly and easily communicate with their loved ones who are in prison. We did not get a chance to really talk about that in great detail, so I would perhaps appreciate an update on those as well. Thank you very much, Jamie. That is helpful. I will move on to Katie Clark and then bring in Fulton MacGregor. It is, however, very important that they are implemented in a sympathetic way, particularly in relation to items of sentimental value. That is something that the committee would want to keep being advised on and would need to satisfy itself that the regulations are being implemented in a way that is sympathetic to individuals who are incarcerated, who are cut off from their families and, obviously, the contact from families and the contact from children in particular is incredibly important to that individual. The committee is very concerned about that aspect and we would want to be kept closely advised on how that is being implemented, particularly to be informed if there were problems and if it was not working in the way that we had understood that it was. It is something that the committee will be monitoring. We had a very full discussion and, privately, all the committee members expressed concerns that that would be the way that we would expect it to be implemented. More generally, I think that the committee feels that it needs more information in terms of the scale of drugs in prisons. I hope that, over the coming period, that will be shared with us, along with the information about how those regulations will be implemented. As has been said, that is only one route that is being used to bring drugs into prison. It is a far larger problem than simply mail. That is something that the committee would want to hear more on and would expect the Scottish Government and the Scottish Prison Service to provide information to us on in the coming period. Finally, I will hand over to Fulton and then I will make a few comments. Thanks, convener. I probably agree with what others have said today. Last week's evidence session on this was really quite useful. It is good to hear that measures came in. There does seem to be some evidence of initial early success with it. Obviously, we all want to make sure that drugs are not getting into prisons. I think that the Russell family articulated it at the start. Often, the consequences of that impact on the individuals and on the health service at this time. If a measure is even seen to be making progress in that area, it is incumbent on us to support it. As others have said as well, I did have concerns. I probably had more concerns before the evidence session last week, but I felt quite reassured listening to the cabinet secretary and how some of the mail would be used. I think that there was quite a clear indication from the prison service that the private mail cannot be read as such and that there are safeguards in place. Nonetheless, all that said, I think that it is something that is very early. It is probably a broad enough measure that it is potential to be implemented in different ways across the sector. For that reason, I would quite like to review it as well, but I am very happy to support it at this point, as it seems to be making an initial difference. I thank all the members for their comments. I think that they are very balanced, measured and set out our thoughts on the evidence that we heard and some of the aspects of the SSI that we would like to monitor and follow-up. It is important that Russell Finlay mentioned or alluded to the issue around looking at this in the context of both prisoners and prison staff. Based on the evidence that we heard last week, I was fairly reassured by what we heard, given that the process had been introduced in relatively quick time. I also feel that we perhaps would benefit from some more information on the practicalities of the process of monitoring mail and testing it. This comes down to ensuring that there is proportionality in the practice that prison officers will be involved in monitoring mail. We have written to the Scottish Prison Service Police Scotland on its response when psychoactive substances are found and the cabinet secretary with some additional questions that we identified during last week's session. I completely agree with Katie's comment on the sentimental value of correspondence and the need for careful consideration of how that is handled and managed. Jamie Greene made a very relevant point about other options around correspondence and communication. I think that we included some questioning around that in some of our follow-up letters. We are more than happy for us to publish our responses, and we will monitor and review the matter. On the basis of members' comments, are we content that we have no further recommendations to make on the SSI and the evidence that we heard? I agree. Just before we move on, I thank all the witnesses who contributed to our evidence session with written submissions, the Scottish Centre for Criminal Justice Research, Families Outside and, as Pauline McNeill alluded to, the miscarriage of justice organisation for their submissions. They were very helpful for us, so we very much appreciate your support in that. Thank you for that. Our next agenda item is consideration of the Scottish Government response to the committee's pre-budget scrutiny report. I refer members to paper 2, and I thank the cabinet secretary for justice and veterans for his detailed response. I invite members to share their views or follow-up action that they would like the committee to take forward in response to the cabinet secretary's reply. I will open it up at this point. I am not seeing any hands or anybody wanting to speak. Kate, I will bring in, I think that we have Russell and then I will bring in Pauline McNeill, and I think that I saw Fulton McGregor's hand go up. Russell, over to you. Yes, thank you. There is quite a lot to go at, so I will not talk about everything that has jumped out at me. I am sure that others will come in and perhaps at the end, if I have missed anything, I could revisit first time. The cabinet secretary makes a reference to the drug's death task force. It is not clear from the papers whether his reply to the committee predates the resignation of the task force chair and deputy chair, which happened over Christmas new year period. The Scottish Government's approach is counterproductive and driven by meeting targets rather than sustainable change. That is clearly of significant concern to anyone who has an interest in our record drug's death levels. It is important that we pay some attention to what they are saying and work out what has gone wrong, because clearly something has gone wrong here. I will make one other point if it is okay. It is in relation to fatal accident inquiries. The response from the cabinet secretary on the one hand says that we are not complacent, but it seems to simultaneously suggest that the system works. This is point 177 on the papers. Again, it clearly is not working. There is huge and growing backlog. Some of that is to do with Covid, but not all of it. Many of those cases are lasting for years and the pain that is causing to families who have lost someone is just horrific. I do not see how the not being complacent comment sits with the apparent position of everything being okay. I will leave those two points just now and then let someone else come in. I will move on to Pauline McNeill and then I will bring in Rona Mackay. Pauline, over to you. I will follow on from the point that Finlay McNeill made earlier about the report on reference to fatal accident inquiries. There is a lot to welcome, let me say that, but there are just a few points that I do think need further investigation or amplification. I am surprised that the cabinet secretary thinks that the current system related to death and custody represents the right model for the future. Given the extraordinary length of time that families are waiting, there seems to be a big piece of work to be needed here by the Scottish Government and some investment. I also do not fully understand what the relationship between that is and the recent statement of where death and custody would be investigated independently, where we heard that powers would be given to ensure that those tasks could get on with the job. It says that there is no barriers or unfettered access to get to the bottom of death and custody. Given that, we have heard an extraordinary number of death and custody and what a family is really concerned about the length of time. I do not expose a share in Russell's comments in relation to the seem to be a bit of complacency there. I would have thought that Paul Hatton needs to be some investment attention to that. Secondly, in relation to the question of victims' implementation of specific measures in victims in witness in Scotland 2014, such as victims being offered support when making a statement, it seems to be a theme for this committee in exploring whether there should be more formal support for victims in the system, either to be legally represented or more supported. That is, for me, further investigation on that one. The Government's excellent work on violence against women and girls is a comprehensive programme. I suppose that what I would like to see is the investment going forward and how to ensure that the action plan is sustainable with achievements along the way. I have made the Parliament a number of times. I think that there are some cross-cutting issues with justice and my imaginary qualities. In relation to attitudes and violence against women and girls, where we have seen high levels of sexual harassment towards girls at a very young age, and we have discussed in some of the private sessions some concerns about issues such as rape culture and social issues. I would like to see some cross-cutting investment between justice and the other departments that have an obvious interest in that. Thanks very much, Pauline. I will bring in Rona Mackay and then collect Stevenson. Thanks, convener. I will go backwards and agree with Pauline on the violence against women and girls issue. I would like to see more cross-cutting between committees taking place. It is a huge subject, and it is one that we need to keep pursuing and tackling ahead on. I agree with Pauline's comments. I would not repeat them all, but I agree with all of that. On the FAI question, I think that clearly there have been serious issues and there are issues in families that have concerns. However, the cabinet secretary's response was that they are taking note of the recent death and custody report that he has made about an extensive statement in the chamber. To acknowledge the seriousness, it may be up to you, convener, but it may be a letter to drill in a wee bit further on that issue. The fact that the death and custody report, which was excellent and all-encompassing, is being considered is a good thing, but we probably need a bit more reassurance on that one. On the drug's death task force that Russell talked about, I completely disagree with him that there is any point in us going over that again. The two members who left have all been made public. I see no merit in us drilling back into that. Certainly acknowledging the work that they have been involved in is fine, but I do not see that that would move us forward in any way. I am not sure that there is a great deal of public interest. I think that what the public want now is just to move on and get things done. That is my opinion on that one. Thanks very much, Rona. I will bring in Collette and Jamie Greene. Thanks, convener. Good morning, committee. I wanted to touch on the FAIs. One of the things that I had picked up on was that there had been issues in the past with the procurement contract with the pathology and toxicology. Audit Scotland raised that as well during their annual audit report. I took some comfort from the previous committee meeting that we had with the Lord Advocate. In that, they said that there was a new contract brought out, which might reduce the length of times that some of the FAIs are taking place. Just to note that it has obviously been a big issue during the pandemic, where we are staying on the NHS. I really just wanted to note that as well. Thanks, convener. Thank you very much, Collette. I will bring in Jamie Greene. I will bring in Russell Assie. He would like to come back in and then I will make some final comments. Jamie Greene Thank you, convener. I will try and rattle through those. It is helpful that I will identify them in relativity to the committee's conclusions by number. I will start with 139. That is in response to the overall budget. The cabinet secretary responds that there will be a 7 cent increase in the portfolio's resource budget, but it is unclear if or what any increase in capital budget will be from that response. That is important because it comes up later in some of our recommendations. In response to prisons and prisoner form, again, there is an increase of £15 million to the SPS's resource budget. It is unclear where that money is going or what it is for, staff or other forms of people-related expenditure rather than things. The £73 million capital funding is merely an extension of existing commitments. It will enable the conclusion of construction of female custodial estate and completion of other pieces of work, such as in Vanessa and Barlinny, which we know, for example, may already be going over budget. That does not seem to be new money. I mentioned that because point 162 says that there is no increase in the capital budgets for either Police Scotland or SFRS. It seems to me that the only capital money that is mentioned is money that we already knew about in that respect. That, for example, will not cover anything that goes towards investment in HMP green accord on freeze. That does not necessarily mean complete replacements, it could just be necessary infrastructure upgrades, as per the recommendations of the Prime Minister. I would say that, in relation to point 162 in the police capital budget, it was very clear from the evidence given to us, not just by the police but by other stakeholders, including the Federation, that there would be an absolute necessity for increased capital for essential modernisation, but not just cherry-picking upgrades but things that would be necessary to allow police to continue in their duties. It seems to me that there is nothing in there for digital ICT or fleet for police estate and, indeed, the greening or net zero targets of the police either, which is noted. We also heard, for example, from the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, at least from their union, if nothing else, that some of the fire estate is not fit for purpose. There is a £9.5 million mention of modernisation, but I am not quite sure where that £9.5 million is going. It certainly does not seem to scratch the surface of probably what is needed. Those are not necessarily criticisms, they are just observations of the responses. The point 173 was about the national community justice strategy. It just says in response that it is under development and it will launch this year, but it does not mention what budget will be allocated, because we have made a very specific ask that it should be adequately funded, and I note that no response was given to that. Probably the other major area of contention from my point of view was around legal aid. The committee took a lot of evidence on that issue, and I appreciate that some of it is a matter of disagreement between very stakeholders who do accept that. However, we made it very clear that the profession, if nothing else, was clear that the Government had failed to address issues around fees and negotiations around that. The one-line answer was that the Government did not accept that position. It then went on not to respond to points 182 or 184, which would also include a very helpful suggestion around public defence listers, which I thought came from other members as we went through the process. The Government simply replies by saying that no response was provided. In my view, that is just not good enough. It is the same for 182 as well. On the issue of tackling drug deaths, it is disappointing to read in points 189 and 191 that the Government has refused to respond. We made a specific recommendation for a modest injection of funds—or, for example, apologies—into recovery clinics and prisons, where we talked about that already in committee this morning. Residential rehab and community day centres and a bit of clarification as to how all the budgets work together, because we know that the drug deaths crisis is one that crosses many portfolios. The Government's response to both was simply that no response was provided, which, given the gravity of the situation, is disappointing. Those are, perhaps, issues that we may want to, at some point in reflection of the budget process, look back on or, indeed, push the Government further on. Thank you for your time, convener. Thank you very much, Jamie. Russell, I think that you want to come in and then I'll come in after you. Yes, thank you. In respect of what Jamie said, I was going to raise a couple of these points, so that's good that you did. PDSOs—yes, indeed, we asked about that, but we didn't get any kind of response—but, going back to the drug's death task force, we all know that 1,339 people in Scotland died last year from drugs. That task force has given us a job of doing something about that. The head and the chairman and the deputy chair, both of whom are credible and eminent people, have quit. I don't think that we know enough about that, and I know that there's perhaps a tendency to want to move along, but I think that if we put our fingers in our ears and don't explore this further, it sends out a pretty bad signal. What we do know just by virtue of what's been in the media is that those two individuals believe that the direction of travel is counterproductive. That is pretty fundamental. It is counterproductive to do something about the drug's death toll, but I think that it would be a missive as not to explore that further. I thank members for their comments. There's a lot in there. Some of the issues that have been raised, I would agree with in particular around the question that Jamie raised about the capital budget in particular for policing. There's also a lot in there on the issues around FEIs and deaths in custody, which we all acknowledge and agree. There has been a lot of work and progress made around that, but that is an issue that we need to monitor and keep an eye on. What I would propose is, in response to the points that you have made, we can consolidate them. It would also be a question of whether we want to follow that up with some correspondence with the cabinet secretary or clarity on the points that have been made or whether we are content with the reply that he previously provided. I open that question up again if members want to agree some follow-up correspondence with the cabinet secretary. Jamie, I see you at your hand up. On the issue of legal aid, for example, where the Government simply responds and says, with respect, we disagree, that is fine. It is entirely within its rights to either disagree with stakeholders who have given evidence or the recommendations or the summary of the committee. It is entirely appropriate for the Government to disagree with committees and their findings. That is common, and I do not have a problem with that. However, where they have not answered a question at all on very important issues, I would push back, simply, uncontroversially and say that, with respect to the cabinet secretary, the committee made a recommendation. Just to say that no response has been provided simply is not good enough. If the responses come further back and say that it is not possible or that I disagree or whatever, that is fine. That is a response, but no response is not a response. I would be minded on those issues to push back. It is also worth noting, however, that this is just a draft budget. The budget will go through its iterative process. The political parties and their spokespeople are within their rights to press the Government for more money on whatever they want, and that will form part of those negotiations. There may be other opportunities in which we can do some of this as a committee and revisit it as it goes through the process. Certainly, by the time we get to the final stages of the budget, we will know what the final numbers are, because it is not necessarily given that what has been presented to us are the final numbers. I am sure that the cabinet secretary has the wherewithal to request for as much as he thinks is needed from his colleagues and Government off the back of the committee's recommendations. Perhaps we could ensure that we are scheduling some opportunity in the future for the committee to review later iterations of the numbers to see if it meets it in some way in some of our asks. Jamie, Katie Clark, I see that you would like to come in over to you. Yes, thank you very much. On the correspondence in response to the cabinet secretary, I think that it is important that we push on the deaths and custody issue. However, the other issue that I think that it would be useful to ask about is a lot of the evidence that we have taken and the discussion that we have had round about how sexual offences and domestic abuse are dealt with and how that relates to the budget, in particular the new budget strategy. It may well be that any financial implications of the implementation of any measures that are necessary would be dealt with in the new justice strategy. I am not sure, but it does seem to me that if they are talking about significant changes going forward in terms of how sexual offences and violence against women and girls are dealt with, there must be financial implications of that, so it might be quite useful to use the correspondence to see if we can get some more detail on that in terms of what the thinking is. Okay, thanks very much. Thank you for those follow-up comments. At the moment, my thought would be, and I will ask members for agreement on this, is at Jamie's point about the draft budget point at the moment. What I would propose is that we, obviously some of the issues that we feel quite strongly about are ones that I have no doubt we will come back to, certainly within our work programme going forward. In that regard, I propose that, as we work through our work programme, that gives us an opportunity to monitor budgetary issues and aspects of the work that we are looking at and where there are issues that come up around this particular topic. We can raise them at that point and in the appropriate way. Are members in agreement with that? Anybody not in agreement? Finally, I would just like to pick up on the point that, Russell Finlay, we are making in relation to the task force and the recent resignations. I do understand where you are coming from with that. I am not sure that that is necessarily directly a budgetary issue, but I am sure that we will have some further discussion about that in the context of the issue that you raised just a few moments ago. If we are content to not issue any further correspondence to the cabinet secretary in line with the budget response that he provided us with, I will bring this agenda item to a close. I thank you all for your comments and contributions. We will now move into private session. That concludes the public part of this meeting. Our next meeting will be on Wednesday, 26 January. We will now move into private session and move on to MS teams.