 I want to ask members who are leaving the chamber to do so as quickly as possible. The final item of business is a business debate on motion 7.5.9, in the name of Russell Findley, on victims awareness week. 있 Ymch码 yw'r gwneud wrthiasn am ynchaynwyr cymhwylo. The debate will be concluded without any questions being put. I invite members who are wishing to participate to press the requests and the speak buttons now or as soon as possible. That's possible? Thank you, Presiding Officer. This debate marks victims support Scotland, Victims Awareness Week, which runs until Sunday. Over the past few years I've learned much about this charity and the valuable work that it does. Chief Executive Kate Wallace's evidence to the Justice Committee is always illuminating Frank, and to the point, unlike some politicians it might well be said. Felly, mae'n cyntaf o'r cyllid yn ddyn, rydyn ni'n cael ei wneud o'r cyfnodau yn gwybodaeth. Mae CSS oedd o'n cael ei bod yn gweithio'r cyllid yn cyd-gweithiau. Ond mae'r brê, a'r butter, yn gwybod ei fod yn cael ei gyd-gweithio'r cyllid, yn ddyn o'r cyfnodau, ac yn eu hwnnw, sydd yn gallu i'r ysgrifennu. Mae'n cael ei gyd-gweithio'r cyfrifennu, mae'n cymdeithasol â ddod yn cael ei gyd-gweithio'r cyfrifennu. The first was almost a year ago to mark world press freedom day as a former journalist and passionate believer in the importance of a vibrant and varied news media. As opposed to the subject of today's debate, it is also personal in that I, like so many others, have been a victim of serious crime. Members may be aware that I was subject of a targeted attack because of my past work investigating organised crime and I was very fortunate not to have suffered any permanent or long-term harm. Some people do not like the word victim, preferring survivors. It is a personal choice. I do not categorise myself as either having been a victim of crime does not define me. However, it did give me a useful insight into Scotland's criminal justice system. Falling victim to crime can be unsettling, traumatic, even life-changing. However, how many times have we heard victims saying the same things? That the process of the justice system was as big an ordeal, sometimes even worse than the crime itself. A strange and self-serving world, formal, hostile and alien to outsiders, the rules are mystery. To victims it can be impersonal and intimidating, daunting and despairing. How many times have we heard the following from victims, deprived of basic information with what they are told often being grudging or in jargon, their lives trapped in limbo as criminals play games and cases are prolonged for years, re-traumatised by hostile treatment in court, belittled and made to feel as if they are in trial, seeing criminals being costeted and pandered to as if they were the victims, shut out and powerless as prosecutors strike secret plea deals with defence lawyers, often distorting and diluting reality. If justice is eventually done, being left scurned by sentences that do not match the gravity of the crime. Every day in every court in Scotland, VSS volunteers are there for those victims. This afternoon in Glasgow, the first ever VSS excellence awards took place, with 20 employees and volunteers being recognised for their endeavours. I commend the winners and each of the 230 volunteers who give up their time to offer practical help and moral support. Being a victim can have a profound impact emotionally, mentally, physically but also financially, which brings me to the VSS emergency assistance fund, which has expanded in recent years and I do not think is widely known about victims whose lives have been plunged into turmoil through no fault of their own can readily and rapidly access practical support. The fund is flexible, it can cover the cost of emergency food supplies, household goods, clothing or security equipment. For those families who have lost a loved one to murder, there is support for funeral costs. I have great empathy for those who have suffered from serious crime, the Scottish Government and its criminal justice agencies frequently talk about the importance of victims' rights, but I do sometimes fund myself questioning whether such talk is truly sincere. To be fair, and I'm nothing if not fair, there has been meaningful improvement across the UK in recent years. Last night's BBC two documentary called Parole was fascinating and insightful. Viewers were shown that full parole process is taking place in England, and I hope that one day Scotland will eventually embrace similar transparency. I've got no doubt that the evolution of victims' rights will continue, campaigners like Kate Wallace will keep rattling cages and bending ears, but it's clear that there is still so much more to do. Bob Doris, first of all, I apologise, Mr Finlay. I haven't signed your motion, that was remiss of me, I would have done so, so I apologise for that. Having read the motion ahead of this evening's debate, I didn't see a mention of the support that Victim Support Scotland gives to those who are victims of crime overseas, often losing loved ones overseas, and that can include financial support and all kinds of support and assistance. I just want to put that on the record, because I've seen first hand the benefit that Victim Support Scotland offers my constituents both at home and when tragedy happens abroad. I fully agree with Bob Doris that there's a first, but thank you for that contribution. A few weeks ago, Victim Support Scotland arranged private meetings between victims and members of the Justice Committee. Frankly, what we heard was truly harrowing bright, happy and ordinary lives suddenly cloaked by darkness. The darkness became prolonged as victims became ensnared by the criminal justice machine, yet those brave and articulate people glowed with a shining spirit of strength and resilience. I thank them for their testimony, which was humbling and inspiring, but sadly all too familiar. Their motivation for talking to us was not for their benefit, but for the benefit of future victims. One spoke about their frustration with Scotland's victim notification scheme, which we know is beset by problems. The on-going review into VNS cannot be botched. It must be fixed. I also commend my colleague Jamie Greene, who is bringing forward his far-reaching and practical Victim's Bill, and my other colleague Pam Gossel, who is working in a member's bill, who will create a domestic abuse register. This week marks Victim's Awareness week, but fighting for the rights of victims should not just be for one week of the year. As MSPs, we have a duty to ensure that the rights of victims form the cornerstone of our justice system. I used to get frustrated hearing about the agony of victims being aggravated by the injustice of the justice system. I no longer get frustrated but angry, and I think that we all should get angry. Thank you. We now move to the open debate. I call for Shona Mackay to be followed by Pauline McNeill for around four minutes, Ms Mackay. I am pleased to be speaking in this important debate, and I thank Russell Findlay for bringing it to the chamber for his articulate speech. Victim's Support Scotland's Victim's Awareness week is incredibly important and highlights the need to focus on those who need support after a traumatic event in their lives. It is a matter of how seemingly trivial the crime is, the effect on the victim's life and mental health can be enormous. I have worked with Victim's Support Scotland since being elected in 2016, and being a member of the Justice Committee, I have the utmost respect for the work that they do. Financial and emotional support is available at a time when people are their most vulnerable. Russell Findlay mentioned the Emergency Relief Fund, which I had not known about until recently, and it is absolutely amazing. Practical solutions can be found to the most difficult situations victims find themselves in, and understanding care and a listening ear is there when it is most needed. The Scottish Government knows only two well the issues faced by victims, which admittedly have not been focused on enough over the years. It has provided £250,000 over three years to fund trauma specialists to help develop a framework for training staff to create a more trauma-informed and trauma-responsive justice system. Last year, £48 million was awarded to more than 20 victims organisations through our new victim-centred approach fund as part of our commitment to putting victims front and centre of the justice system. A total of £413,727 has been awarded to organisations since the Scottish Government launched the Victim Surcharge Fund in 2019, and an independent review of the victim notification scheme led by Alistair MacDonald, former chair of Victim Sports Scotland. Violence against women and girls, including domestic abuse, is one of the most devastating and fundamental violations of human rights. It is vital that perpetrators are held to account and that women and children have access to front-line services dealing with violence and domestic abuse. Through the Delivering Equally Safe Fund, we are dedicating £11 million over a two-year period to tackle domestic abuse and support those affected by it. Of course, the Domestic Abuse Scotland Act 2018 created a specific offence of domestic abuse that covers not just physical abuse but other forms of psychological abuse, as well as coercive and controlling behaviour. A commitment by the Scottish Government very close to my heart is the Bairnshooth, which aims to help children, children and witnesses recover emotionally and physically while gathering legally robust evidence. It is based on an alternative model, first developed in Iceland in 1998, called Barnaws. In the last parliamentary session, the Justice Committee, of which I was then, and still am, a member, visited Norway to see this amazing initiative for ourselves. We witnessed child protection, health, police investigation and judicial procedures, mental wellbeing and recovery support being practised all under one roof, with the ethos of professionals going to the child rather than the child reliving trauma in a justice system designed for adults. I am delighted that we will be making this available in Scotland by 2025. I was shocked recently to discover that stalking and domestic abuse are not among the crimes listed eligible for victim impact statements that are submitted to the court before sentencing. That makes no sense, as surely the devastating effect of those crimes needs no explanation. The list must be widened to include those crimes and I hope that the minister will address this anomaly in summing up. Finally, after this debate tonight, I am convening the cross-party group on women, families and justice. Let's not forget that children and families are victims of crime 2 in every circumstance and they must always be supported. In conclusion, I thank Victim Support Scotland and other organisations, including many volunteers, for the amazing work that they do to help people in their time of need. I call Polly McNeill, who joins us remotely and will be followed by Pam Gosall. Ms McNeill, around four minutes please. Thank you. I would like to begin by thanking Russell Findlay for bringing forward this very important issue for debate during Victim Support Scotland's Victim Awareness week. I commend Russell Findlay's many contributions in this Parliament. I know that he is dedicated to that. I also met Victim Support Scotland recently, who showed me around the amazing facilities in place in Glasgow for complainers, giving evidence remotely or by commission. It is a significant step in our justice system and one that can, it is already making a difference, and I commend the organisation for doing that. As a member of the Justice Committee, like Rona Mackay and Libra Spokesperson on justice, I am dedicated to listening to victim survivors highlighting their experiences and championing their rights. The testimony of victims of rape and sexual assault indicates that we have a long way to go when we listen to them. Without making a system humane, then we have not really achieved our goals. Without victims speaking up, as Russell Findlay has already said, giving evidence to court, we obviously cannot hold those charged with crimes to account. Today, I also want to take time to champion the rights of women and girls as victims of violent crime in Scotland. A report published by the Scottish Government this month looked into the experience of families who have fallen victim to domestic abuse. So, one woman told of her harrowing experience in the Ararcher Court case and it's not unusual. She said that the police sergeant phoned me following and the following afternoon to tell me that my abuser released on bail and that he was released about an hour ago, an hour to two hours ago, and if I'm in the house to make sure I get out because he'll be there any minute. I mean, that's just unacceptable in this day and age. And you've got to wonder, why would anyone report a crime if they thought this is how the release process would be handled? So, we need radical changes to that. We need to listen to the voices of survivors when we make the big decisions about the reform of the criminal justice system. Delays to hearings being put at physical and mental risk during the court process, all impact on young children have all been highlighted by victim survivors, as major feelings in the current system. Before lockdown, we did have still significant delays in our court system, which is hugely disruptive to the criminal justice process. Alongside the delays, sexual offences cases have been cancelled or rescheduled many times and taking together these represent significant causes for concern as victims and survivors of sexual violence and their advocates, as well as policy makers and parliamentarians demand some change. In the last few years, I do believe there has been significant movement in criminal justice reform policy responses to gender crimes in Scotland, and I would like to thank Victim Support Scotland for their advocacy work on this issue. But unfortunately, we have a long way to go, and the Justice Committee have listened to the testimony of many survivors of rape and sexual assault. On average, in a single day, there's an average of four rates that will be reported to Police Scotland, utterly shocking. I've spoken many times, as is my colleague Keith O'Kark, about the need for victims of sexual assault to have legal representation in our system. I firmly believe that it's time to do that, and I do away with the Scottish Government's plans for reforms around this. In fact, I would have proposed the Member's Bill myself on this very issue, had the Government not proposed to come forward with those reforms. We need to change the system. We need to make sure that it is properly balanced to give victims and survivors of rape and victims of all crime the confidence that they can give evidence in our court system. They will be supported in doing so, and they will make the changes where we can that will make the system better. I commend the work of Victim Support Scotland, and again, thank the member, Russell Findlay, for bringing it forward this evening. Thank you very much. I'm delighted to be contributing to today's extremely important motion on victims of rape this week, and I would like to thank my colleague Russell Findlay for bringing this debate to the chamber. Since I began working on my domestic abuse prevention bill, I have been contacted by a number of women who need help. Those women have sometimes faced threats and abuse from violent individuals for months and sometimes even years, but the comprehensive services offered by victims organisations means that, even in the most difficult of cases, they are able to step in and help those women to get the support that they need. In the last year, Victim Support Scotland has supported around 16,000 people affected by crime, helped over 5,000 witnesses in court, and successfully rolled out more than 1,000 VSS emergency assistance funds. Other examples are the social enterprise, no fear, who draw from their own experiences of childhood trauma and the criminal justice system to support others with lived experiences of trauma through to long-term recovery, or Shuck the Women's Aid, which helps BME women and children affected by domestic abuse. It raised an important point with me around the lack of support for beam survivors of domestic abuse to attend court and the growing need for the citation letter and subsequent information in the victim's mother tongue. In a briefing ahead of today's debate, children's first stated that, at the moment, the system itself creates standalone trauma, often reported to be more harmful than the incident itself. It has this Parliament's duty to ensure that support provided to victims from the third sector is met with a robust response and from this within the criminal justice system itself. As my colleague Russell Finlay highlighted, that is not always the case. The HMICS report recommended that there should be increased training, understanding and more informed approach to domestic abuse by justice professionals. Similarly, responses to the Scottish Government's Violence Against Women and Girls funding review published last month found that many respondents felt that third sector organisations should act as a bridge between victims and the statutory services, encouraging reporting of violence against women and girls, especially among hard-to-reach groups because they can bring the voice of lived experiences to the statutory sector, or because they are more approachable and can be more accessible to particular groups of women, i.e. BME women or women with disabilities. However, respondents also wanted to see tougher punishments for abusers. Scottish Women's Aid and others have said that they are concerned about the impact of reducing prison sentences on victims. While just recently Kate Wallace of Victim Support Scotland told the Criminal Justice Committee that victims often feel as though they have to police the bail conditions themselves and they often do not know what those are, that is simply not good enough. While we mark Victim Awareness week, it is important that this week and every other week we keep in mind the work carried out by organisations, staff and volunteers to improve the lives of victims in Scotland. However, should this Parliament and the SNP Government fail to adopt a victim-centred trauma-informed approach when it comes to policymaking, we risk undermining the hard work of victim support organisations and further traumatising victims. I think that I speak on behalf of everyone in this chamber, when I say that even though many of us hope that we never have to rely on these services, we must do everything in our power to ensure that we are supporting the organisations that champion the rights of those who do. I now call Faisal Choudhury to be followed by Stephen Kerr in four minutes. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. Thank you, Russell Fenley, for bringing this important topic to the chamber. Through supporting victims, we are able to give their voices a flat from where developing a deeper learning about their experiences and the lives of those affected by crime. Victim support Scotland seeks to undertake fantastic work. However, my constituents have reported that they are overworked and very difficult to get in contact with when they are needed most. In order to ensure victims of crime are supported and their voice heard, we must ensure that there is a place for them within the criminal justice system. This system requires improvements if it is to meet the specific needs of every victim and ensure that justice is served. It is vital that our justice system is heard to be sensitive to the multiplicity of needs of victims that will transcribe through it and that respect is shown to each and every individual. The Parliament will be aware of the previous cases of unlawful organ retention in the NHS over 20 years ago. My constituent, Lydia Reid, has been fighting for justice for her son, Gary Payton, since he died in 1975. Mrs Reid has long believed that Gary was a victim of unlawful organ retention and that he was not buried in 1975 as she was led to believe. Mrs Reid recently received the outcome of the Crown Office investigation into her son's death and burial, which she vehemently disagrees with. Mrs Reid wishes to bury Gary as soon as possible. However, due to legal system which will only give families back their loved ones' belongings once they say they will not appeal verdicts. Mrs Reid was almost forced to choose between justice and being able to bury her son before she was given a concession. I've heard of experiences from constituents where they feel they have faced hostility and misogyny when reporting domestic abuse, feeling that they were dismissed rather than receiving the care and justice they deserved. I've also heard of cases from constituents whose additional support needs were not considered when involved with the police and judicial system, so they were effectively shut out of the justice process due to inaccessibility. Why do we have a justice system that opts for a one-size-fits-all approach? Every victim experience says crime differently, whether that be because of their gender, age, race, identity, or social economic status. Every situation surrounding crime happens and evolves differently. To fully understand and support victims and survivors through the system, we must have a flexible system that takes every victim's need into consideration. Only then can we hope to fully champion the rights of all crime victims and I hope that we can achieve improvements within the criminal justice system in time for victims' awareness week 2024. First of all, I congratulate Russell Finlay on bringing this motion to the chamber and for his speech, which was, as usual, absolutely first class. I pay tribute to the work of Victim Support Scotland and for its on-going efforts to support victims, but also to put victims where they ought to be. Faisal Chowdry said that there should be a place for victims in the justice system, and I would put it to the chamber and to the minister that victims should be at the very centre of the justice system. Sadly, that is not the case. I have a post bag, as I am sure everyone else does in this Parliament, and it is most often filled with people, sadly, who are feeling the blunt end of the injustice that victims often experience. I am thinking particularly of a couple of my constituents who have been going through hell on the receiving end of anti-social behaviour that the police have said that they can do nothing about. The kind of vulnerability that victims experience and the lack of help that they often receive are, I think, at the heart of Victim Awareness Week. When it comes to politics—I know that we have heated debates in this chamber, but we just had one before this member's business began—the truth is that there is a lot that unites us, and most of us are in this place, if not all of us, to promote the common good, because that is at the centre of our politics, what brings us into politics. The way that we accommodate each other in debate is by listening and engaging. Listening is at the heart of the issue that we are debating tonight. I feel as if it is—if you do not listen to people, you cannot understand their experience, you cannot understand what they are going through, and you cannot understand what is motivating them. Ultimately, you cannot understand what is in their best interests. The lack of listening, the lack of consideration towards victims of crime is one of the biggest problems that we face in our justice system. If the chamber will forbear with me if I might just very quickly refer to a personal experience, and I know that Russell Finlay could have dwelt on his personal experience but did not, but I hope that the chamber will forgive me if I do talk about my personal experience. My wife and I have for some time now many years had a stalker, and I will not go into the details or disclose all that we have been through or the impact that it has had on our family life or on our children and our grandchildren and how they view even coming to visit our home. However, I will pay tribute to Police Scotland who, on the last episode where this individual tried to kill—that was what he was promised—he was promised to kill. In fact, I had a message from my wife while I was sitting in this very chamber that Police Scotland had come to the door to ask if I was still alive. I got this message on my phone from my wife saying, Stephen, are you still alive? You think it's a joke, but it's not. The police had apprehended this individual who was threatening to kill me, and the police were doing their job, and I paid tribute to the police, particularly in Stirling. It was Michael Marra, my colleague Labour member who is in the Education, Children and Young People's Committee, who said to me one day, I'm sorry for everything that you're going through. That's an unusual reach across the island politics if he thinks things are tough for us politically, but it wasn't anything to do with politics. He had read a story in the Dundee Courier where there was a reported court case where my wife and I had been named in the story, and it was the court case of this individual who had threatened to kill me. I knew nothing about it. Didn't know anything about it. Obviously, you contacted the court. My wife contacted the court where the case was on-going. Clearly, having been identified as a victim, you would think that they might be willing to tell you something about it, but she was told that under data protection they couldn't tell her anything about the case. I'll not go on, but needless to say, at no point since that moment until well past the point where this individual had been found guilty and sent to prison having already been on remand for six months, so I think that probably underlines the seriousness of the case, but at no point did anyone actually contact us and talk to us. I used the privilege, Deputy Presiding Officer, that I have as a member of this Parliament to raise this issue with the Lord Advocate, and I gave thanks to her office for the way that they eventually did respond to the circumstances that you were in, but I'm a member of the Scottish Parliament. My heart goes out to so many of my constituents in central Scotland who don't have the advantages and privileges that I made use of. It's not right. It's absolutely not right that people in Scotland who are victims of crime are left so often on their own, vulnerable to the consequences of what has happened to them through no fault of their own. I say again, is it too much to ask that victims be at the heart of our justice system? Thank you very much, Mr Kerr. I now call on the minister to respond to the debate, minister, for around seven minutes, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I too want to congratulate Mr Finlay not only on securing this debate during Victim Support Scotland's Victims Awareness week, but also Victim Support Scotland for the success of the week so far, and as others have noted, yesterday was the European day for victims of crime making this debate even more apt. I also associate myself with the words of Mr Finlay when he congratulated those recognised today by Victim Support Scotland's Excellence Awards. I'm pleased to close these proceedings for the Scottish Government. We support Mr Finlay's motion wholeheartedly. Reflecting the people at the heart of Victim's Awareness week, I want to begin with a few words for those affected by crime, also clearly set out by Mr Kerr. Victim or survivor, those are short words, but they carry a weight of meaning for those to whom they are attached. It is easy to feel far removed from the possibility of being affected by crime, but a victim of crime can be anyone, as we've already heard today. It can be a friend, it can be a parent, a carer, a sibling, a child, a colleague or even your own self. I know that many colleagues have their own direct experiences, as we've already heard today. In other words, there is no them, it's only us. With that in mind, I want to say to all people affected by crime that this Government is with you. We are committed to upholding your rights and to making sure that the justice system recognises your experiences, as well as the impact that crime can have on you, or more simply, we see you, we hear you and we believe you. I think that that's important, that we have to set out that victims of crime need to be at the centre of a justice system. The recognition that Mr Finlay had for the movement in that direction, not just here, but across the UK and indeed across the world. Thank you, minister, for taking an intervention. Yesterday, I had a visit to Aberdeen police station to talk to some of the officers there. They spoke about the huge backlog in the court system. Do you accept that that backlog adds a lot of stress to the victims of crime, and the more we can do to remove that backlog, the better for the victims? I would absolutely agree with that. I think that any time that people spend waiting for justice or having access to justice will exacerbate their feelings of helplessness in a system. I think that the money that the Scottish Government has put in there to try and aid that system to recover is absolutely vital, but it's important that we keep an eye on that as things progress. We're joined by countless others in our support to victims. If we think about Victim Support Scotland, we crisis Scotland, assist Scottish Women's Aid and countless others provide crucial assistance to people affected by crime. As a former Women's Aid worker for more than a decade and as someone who's previously been supported by Victim Support Scotland, I wholeheartedly commend those organisations for all they do to support victims of crime and indeed all of those leaders at the heart of them. If we think about Kate Wallace, if we think about Sandy Brindley and if we think about Marsha Scott from Women's Aid. Thank you for your dedication and your compassion. I know from comments made in the chamber this evening that others here share my views of the vital needs to raise awareness of what those organisations do. The Government is pleased to support those bodies and in turn people affected by crime themselves in this work. So I'm delighted to be able to announce this evening that we will be awarding over £500,000 to Victim Support organisations through the Victim Surcharge Fund. Those funds will be used to provide direct support to victims and survivors. The new awards will bring the total granted under the fund to £900,000 since it was established in 2019 and further information about this will be published tomorrow morning on the Scottish Government's website. As mentioned by Rona Mackay, those bills on our announcement in March last year that we are awarding £48 million to more than 20 Victim Organisations through the Victim Centered Approach Fund from 2022 to 2025. Recipients include Victim Support Scotland, Trafficking Awareness, Raising Alliance and Migrant Help. We are also providing around £15.6 million each year to victims of violent crime through the Criminal Injuries Compensation Fund and we are investing £38 million over two years through the Delivering Equally Safe Fund, which tackles violence against women and girls. I think that it's close to many people's hearts, including myself and Pauline McNeill, as we heard from her earlier. It's not just about money. Our victims task force has been mentioned as driving action to improve the experiences of people affected by crime within the criminal justice system. It's jointly chaired by the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Veterans and the Lord Advocate and includes representatives from Victim Support organisations such as VSS and criminal justice agencies, the legal profession and academia. However, it's also important to note that the task force welcomes the newly established victims advisory board comprised of people affected by crime directly themselves. That will ensure that their voices are heard as part of the task force work and beyond. That's really important. We have listened to people affected by crime and acknowledged that further work is absolutely necessary to ensure that their needs are better incorporated into Scotland's justice system. That acknowledgement is reflected in the Scottish Government's vision for justice, which envisages a system where people affected by crime will be treated as person first and foremost. Our voices will be heard and will be supported to recover from the trauma that we have experienced. As mentioned by Pam Gossel and Faisal Chowdhry, we must ensure that we take an intersectional approach to domestic and sexual abuse cases and support organisations such as Amina, Hymock Gryff and Shack 2 Women's Aid. We need to ensure that people from all backgrounds are heard in that space. The criminal justice reform Scotland Bill to be introduced is here. We'll support delivery of this vision through... I thank the minister for taking that intervention just on what you've said, minister. Do you believe that our criminal justice system is fit to be serving and delivering for the beam communities? That was something that I heard through when I was doing my domestic abuse prevention consultation. It was an area that one size does not fit all. The member earlier on, Faisal Chowdhry, mentioned that as well. I want to hear from the minister to see that does one size fit all if it doesn't? What is the Government doing about that? I absolutely recognise the case that Pam Gossel puts to me. The women in justice leadership panel that I am currently chairing that we'll be reporting soon actually put that intersectionality approach right at the heart of what we were looking at. We heard from groups like Amina and others where we were understanding that we have to actually make adjustments within the system so that people actually feel as if they are heard and their needs are met. That's absolutely something that I do recognise. The criminal justice reform Bill to be introduced this year will support delivery of the vision through provisions that will remove the not-proven verdict and grant automatic anonymity to complainers and sexual offences cases, whilst also working towards the access to independent legal advice. I know that this is something that Pauline McNeill mentioned earlier. We are also funding trauma specialists to develop a training framework for staff to create a more trauma-informed and trauma-responsive justice system. That's really vital. We are not stopping there. The Scottish Government is committed to preventing and eradicating violence against women and girls, and we are implementing equally safe Scotland strategy for achieving that. We are working with justice partners to promote a system that encourages women's active participation across the criminal justice system. That also speaks to what Pam Goswell was just saying before. As also mentioned by Rona Mackay, the introduction of our bairnshorse module will put children and young people's needs front and centre. I want to conclude by reaffirming the Government's commitment to stand by people affected by crime to uphold their rights and embed their lived experience in a justice system that is trauma-informed and sensitive to their needs. That will include looking at how we can improve accessibility to be able to give victim impact statements by moving forward with pilots to expand the scheme to include more types of offences. I think that that's really important. We will continue to work with victim support organisations as part of that. Again, I wholeheartedly commend the work of those organisations, and I welcome that debate as an opportunity to shine the light on the crucial work that they do.