 Okay, thank you and good morning and welcome to the fourth meeting of s.6 of the Qualities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee and we have no apologies for today's meeting. The Fulton McGeigher and Karen Adam are joining us virtually today and Richard Leonard is also joining the session today and we welcome Richard to the meeting. Our first agenda item is consideration of an affirmative instrument, the draft maximum number of worse judges, Scotland Order 2022, and I welcome to the meeting Keith Brown, cabinet secretary for justice and veterans, and Scottish Government officials, Ryan McRobart, head of courts and tribunals, and Joanne Tinto, solicitor legal directorate, who are joining us virtually. I refer members to paper 1. I wonder if I can ask the minister to speak to the maximum number of judges of Scotland order 2022. Thank you very much, convener. I'll be very brief. The maximum number of judges set out in section 1 at 1 of the Court of Session act of 1988. This order in council will increase the maximum number of judges of the Court of Session by 1, from 35 to 36. Judges of the Court of Session also sit as judges of the High Court of Justiciary. An increase in the number of judges of the Court of Session has been precipitated by the recent appointment of Lady Poole as chair of the Covid-19 inquiry. Lady Poole is an outer house judge of the Court of Session on secondment to the inquiry, and during the secondment Lady Poole will not be available to sit in court. However, she remains a judge for the purposes of the statutory limit in section 1, 1 of the 1988 act. As that inquiry is expected to last for several years, the Lord President requested an additional judge to meet the demands of the business in the Court of Session and the High Court. The appointment of Lady Poole to chair the Covid-19 inquiry, coupled with the current high level of court business, means that the appointment of a further judge will provide additional judicial resource during these challenging times. The Lord President does not consider that it is possible to appoint a further series of temporary judges strong from the shrivel bench for this period of time. As that would place additional pressure on the sheriff courts, it would therefore not secure the most efficient disposal of court business. Have you taken account of the number of backlogs during the Covid-19 period in terms of the number of judges that might be required? Do you think that that is enough? Have you considered the Lord President's suggestion that there is primary legislation to look at the number of judges on the basis of the availability of full-time equivalent judges that are available to us? I think that the answer to the second point is no, I'm not sure that we have looked at that from the Lord President, but the order before us today is at the request of the Lord President and it's partly for those reasons that he mentioned, the backlog. We're very keen to make sure that we do tackle the backlog and that's perhaps why we've gone beyond the previous standard of 35, which in itself was increased from 34 in 2016. We don't want to see the business to deal with the backlog slowing down, that's why I want to appoint a further judge. We've also looked at other things that might help in relation to sheriffs that are sometimes elevated in that way, but that would provide more pressure on the sheriff courts, so we are trying to balance that. However, yes, that increases capacity for the court at a time when it would otherwise reduce because of the appointment of Lady Poole to the Child Abuse Inquiry. I'm pretty sure that the Lord President said to me in his letter that it was to do with the backlog, so that has been taken into account. Any further questions for the cabinet secretary? No further questions, so we therefore move straight to item 2, which is the formal business in relation to the instrument. It's consideration of the motion for approval for the affirmative instrument, so I invite the minister to move the motion. Moved. Do any members have any final comments? If not, so are we therefore all agreed? That is agreed and I invite the committee to delegate to me the publication of a short factual report on our deliberations on the affirmative SSI that we have considered today. That concludes consideration of the affirmative instrument. Obviously, the cabinet secretary is staying with us for the next item that the minister's officials online are free to leave. The next item on the agenda is to take evidence from the cabinet secretary as part of our stage 1 scrutiny on the minor strike pardon Scotland bill. I welcome to the meeting Scottish Government officials accompanying the cabinet secretary Elaine Hamilton, head of forensic policy, policy powers unit, police division and Louise Miller, solicitor and legal directorate. I refer members to papers 2 and 3. Can I invite the cabinet secretary to make a short opening statement, please? Thanks again, convener. This landmark bill honours the commitment to which the Scottish Government made to bring forward legislation to pardon minors of certain offences relating to the minor strike of 1984-85. It follows up a recommendation made by an independent review panel that a pardon should be granted to minors who were convicted of certain offences during the strike, subject to qualifying criteria. The pardon was intended to recognise the disproportionate impact felt by those minors as a result of taking part in the strike to restore dignity to them, to help the mining community to heal old wounds. To establish what the qualifying criteria should be, the Scottish Government undertook a public consultation last year, and the provisions in the bill reflect the outcome of that consultation, as well as careful consideration of the available data. It is important to emphasise that there is very little surviving evidence from police and court records from the time of the strike. That is why I do not propose to put in place an application scheme for the pardon. I wish to make the qualifying criteria as simple as possible so that people are able to assess for themselves whether the qualifying criteria for the pardon are met without having to find documentary evidence. Therefore, the bill proposes a collective pardon to minors that will apply automatically to those who meet the qualifying criteria. Those are that the minor's conviction relates to an offence committed while on a picket line, demonstration or similar gathering in support of the strike, or travelling to or from such a gathering. The qualifying offences are breach of the peace, breach of bail conditions and, under section 41a of the Police Scotland Act 1967, commonly known as obstruction. That bill conveners about reconciliation and dealing with the past in a sensitive way. The conditions of the pardon recognise minors and police officers found themselves in extremely challenging situations where relationships came under unprecedented strain. Minors who took part in industrial action did so to protect their jobs, their way of life and their communities. Police officers were only exercising their duty to uphold the law and in circumstances and on a scale that she had never encountered before. The pardon will apply to both the living people and posthumously given the passage of time since the strike. The pardon does not quash a conviction, neither does it create any rights or entitlements. I am clear that the bill should not cast any doubt on decisions made by the judiciary at the time or seek to place blame on any individual or group of individuals. I am keen to probe a little further on the reasoning around having an automatic pardon system rather than a process. The evidence that we have heard from people in mining communities that they would appreciate would be some sort of official confirmation of the pardon, particularly when it is a posthumous pardon so that you have perhaps a widow. I think that there was a feeling that having something that that person was able to show that their loved one had been pardoned would be particularly welcoming. It is whether it is possible to do that without some sort of a process to have an automatic pardon but yet still have some way of having a piece of paper which the person can know that their loved one was pardoned even though they are now gone. That is one of the challenges that we have heard that many of the people who are impacted have passed away. It is a very good point, convener. We are examining what we can do around that. The reason for the automaticity of the pardon is to make it as easy as possible for people who cannot necessarily provide the evidence or documentation. In fact, we cannot provide much of the evidence or documentation to sustain that, but I think that the idea that people really have to know that they have been pardoned is an important point. We are looking at whether we can, first of all, work with the NUM to look at their records to see if they can reach out to as many people as possible. There may be data protection issues in relation to that, but we will observe those, of course. Beyond that, whether we can make a written statement, it will have to rely on some cases on people getting in touch with us because we will not have the information. It will be the case that we will not be able to go into the details of anybody's particular conviction, mainly because those records are no longer held. However, if we are able to do the written letter, it would make explicit the details and the qualifying criteria for the pardon. It would make it clear to that individual and to their family that they were part of that pardon, so that is what we are looking at just now. Is that your request? We are still looking at that, convener, but it is likely to be the case. Apart from, as I said, if we are able, through the NUM's records, and we are starting to get into discussions with them to identify quite a number of people and any certainty around the convictions that they had, if we can do something proactively again, we will look at that as well. However, there are bound to be people who will not be captured by that, and we want to make it as clear as possible. If they want to get in touch with us, we will give them as an explicit statement as possible in writing about the pardon. Thank you very much, cabinet secretary, for those remarks. I hear what you say about the scope of the pardon and it being limited to actions around the picket lines and travel to and from. We have heard from miners who were directly involved in the strike and we have heard from miners and some of the wider community members associated with supporting the striking miners. One of the concerns with that limit of actions around and travel to and from picket lines is that it does not cover everybody. In one of the evidence sessions, we heard somebody say, you know, the pardon is welcome, but it will not mean anything unless it does cover everybody. To give you an example, it was not around a picket line, but as you know, miners who broke the strike were living in the same communities as striking miners and there were often tensions around that. Sometimes the attribution of blame of violence or not violence to people but damage to property was problematic. I think that there are some questions around why those cannot be covered as well, those kinds of incidences that are clearly directly related to the strike, but are not at or around a picket line. Can you say a little bit more about why we cannot extend it or would you look at the option of extending it to actions associated with the miners strike, which would include those kinds of activities in the community? First of all, we will listen to any of the representations that are made. We have had substantial consultation with interested parties, mining communities, trade unions and others. There have been, as you say, calls for offences to be included. Some of those were fall under the 1875 act, which some of you were all very familiar with, but that could cover quite a wide spectrum of behaviour relating to attempting without legal authority to compel another person to support the strike or not go to work, your point about miners that continued to work during that time. It would necessarily cover the use of violence to intimidate another person or their family or damaging their property. It could also cover behaviour such as persistently following another person from place to place or following, along with others, in a disorderly manner another person in or through any street or road. It could cover things like watching or what they call besetting a house. The problem that we have is the lack of any surviving police and court records that make it very difficult to confirm the exact circumstances in those instances that you've mentioned, which are committed during the strike. We couldn't cover, for example, the degree of violence or malice that was involved or where they actually occurred. It's also very difficult to determine the motivation behind such conduct. We do know that there were some cases or reported cases where previous disputes between people were the basis for some of the things that happened during the strike. We have extended what the independent review group said. For example, we're not putting a constraint on it to say that you're disqualified if you've had a previous or a subsequent offence, but we don't think that it would be right to extend it to those other potential offences when we can't ascertain the details of it. We've tried to make it most or exclusively applicable to minors into those incidents that are said in those locations and can be going through communities if that's where people are travelling. That's why we've had those qualifying criteria. Apart from extending it slightly, that's why we've followed the views of the independent review group. I hear that. I'm just looking to see if there is a way through. I appreciate what you say, and I appreciate that the act that you mentioned would cast the net wider than we might think appropriate. I'd be interested in exploring if there is a way through, especially not necessarily the activities that you described. We can't assess malice or that kind of thing. In many ways, we can't make judgments about what happened at the picket lines or travel to and from them either. I think that there is something about understanding that the strike happened in the context of community, not just at the picket lines. Recognising that somehow will be important. I'm not quite sure exactly how, but I think that we need to look at that somehow. It does come down to those judgments. You're absolutely right, but it's also true to say that if we were to try to seek to pardon those convictions, it would set quite a precedent for similar offences committed in current times or in the future. Based on the consultations that we've had, there would be a lot less sympathy for things such as street fights, intimidatory conducts, violence and damage to property. I think that just the point about the picket line is important because the view that we are taking, and you're right that these are judgments that you have to make, is that the balance of probability is that the minus conduct was directly on a picket line or on a demonstration or going through a community to attend one of those things was much more likely that the conduct was directly related to support for saving jobs rather than an action born of anger or retribution against an individual. You're right that it's a question of judgment. That's a judgment that we are making, but of course we'll listen to other points of view. I have no doubt that the stigma behind the whole situation, and as I have said in previous meetings, I don't remember at an industrial dispute being so bitter and so divisive in my lifetime as a youngster I watched as many did unfold in the media and the television. Communities were really badly affected. The whole idea of the pardon is being processed, but it's the community work and what's happening within communities now that is just as important to trying to rebuild some of that process. We're good to get a flavour, what you think should be supported within communities for that reconciliation because there is a desire to try and have that truth and reconciliation. The pardon itself goes some way to addressing that, but it doesn't address what happens within the communities that would affect it, and it would be good to get a flavour of what you think of that. As I've said in the last couple of sessions, some people think that the pardon itself is perceived as rewriting a bit of history in that it was over three decades ago, but the communities today are still in a situation of turmoil three decades later. That's a very good point. Your first point about how divisive it was. Were there other divisive disputes? I remember the whopping dispute, if you remember that one, how divisive that one was, but what was different about that was, as you say, the communities. Whole communities were identified as mining communities, the area that we both represent, for example, having a number of communities and others across Scotland, and it's those communities, the geographical nature of the mine and the community surrounding it, which meant that that division has carried on for all those years. I think that the pardon, just to say, is really important. If you've talked, I know that the committee has to former miners. A number of those people were people who had never been in trouble with the law and felt a degree of shame for having had a conviction. Some didn't, because they felt what they did was justified, acknowledged that, but some felt shame, it was wrong. I think that the impact of a pardon on those that are still with us, that we'll know about that, I think, is quite substantial knowing that it's being pardoned. I think that it will have a big effect, but you're right to say that we have a continuing obligation to those communities. To that extent, I attended on Friday, as it happened, in Hawke Hill Community Centre, an event that was for that centre. They had the Coalfields regeneration represented there, and I spoke to them at some lente, they still do things like football for youngsters in the communities in Tulliburry and so on. We continue to look to support the work of the Coalfields regeneration trust in the former many communities. The annual grant is £754,000 this year, and that's helped to fund grassroots activity, which tackles issues associated with poverty in these areas. You're right to say that there's a long tail of consequences from that dispute and people having lost their jobs that we're still dealing with. I think that we may be, I don't think that the rest of the UK, I'm not sure that Wales have continued with the support for the Coalfields regeneration trust, but we have done that, and we'll continue to work with the trust so that the grant addresses the new challenges, and if we can concentrate our efforts on regenerating those communities that need it most and working with local people to deliver the change that we want to see, that's perhaps the best and most effective thing that we can do to try and help those communities, but I also think that the pardon will have a real tangible effect for many people involved as well. The pardon, as you say, is very tangible. That maybe heals some of the individuals and the families and the way they believe, but the community at the end of the day, as you identify, is what is more important, that we try to rebuild and reorganise and that the support mechanisms that are in place to make that happen are vitally important. The legacy from this bill itself should also try to incorporate some of that to ensure that we're not just looking at something that happened, as I said, 34 or a year ago. It's something that happens today, and the communities today have to still manage that crisis. Is there any scope for you to think about how that might progress within the bill, or are there other ways of doing that in the future? I would say that I don't think that the bill would be the vehicle for doing that. I think that the legacy of the bill will be the impact that the pardon itself has on communities and just to reiterate that it will have a very significant—it's not the state that was in control at the time, but it is the Scottish Government that has now established a saying that we understand the pressures that it has obtained at that time that led people into these situations, and we want as a society to pardon that. That is what the bill—we made it a very simple, straightforward bill for those reasons. I think that you are right, though, that other work has to continue going on. Just to say that work started right away—I know that I used to work for Stirling District Council—and work had gone on right from the strike by that council, and it has various different political guises to support communities in full in and so on. That was true across Scotland, so that is not new. Although, because of the time that has elapsed, the help for regeneration finds itself through different routes, and the main route that the Scottish Government takes through that is to support the co-fueled regeneration trust, and we intend to commit to that. Thank you and online now please to Fulton MacGregor. Thank you very much, convener, and good morning to the cabinet secretary and officials. Just picking up from Alexander Stewart's line of questioning there, I am really glad to hear the cabinet secretary's commitment there. I have got some mining communities in my own constituency, and I witness first hand both the impact of the co-fueled regeneration trust and the work that is done in the support by the Scottish Government, but also the ongoing need to regenerate those communities that are still very much struggling from their mining past. I have got two questions, cabinet secretary. The first one is following on from Maggie Chapman's line of questioning that is about the definition of a miner. Just to see, obviously, we will go into a stage 1 debate in producer report, but it is fair to say that the committee is inclined to think that the scope of the definition of a miner could be increased. I think that Maggie Chapman's question was more around other things that happened in the community, but even on the strikes themselves, we heard some examples of miners having maybe family relatives or others. We heard from one person who was a son of a miner and was on a strike that he never got jobs, but there may be examples of that. Is that something that you would consider widening the scope of the bill to? I think that the answer that I gave to Maggie Chapman would still stand. We did think long and hard as did the independent review group about who was most directly affected. I may feel that it was the miners themselves. Many other people, myself included, got involved in demonstrations at the time, but we do not think so. There are people, students included, and others who received convictions, but we think that it is important that we restrict this to the miners involved and for the qualifying offences. For the reasons that I previously mentioned, it might be worth raising the issue of the definition of a miner that relates to employment of mine owned by the national co-board. I am going to answer that instead of the official. There are a number of matters that have been considered. It is not a straightforward thing informing the Government's position on how a miner should be defined. We consider, as I say, the other people who are most adversely affected by the strike and the consequences of strike-related convictions for the miners themselves. Only mails were allowed to work underground in the UK coal mining industry in 1984-5. Inevitably, the focus on the numbers that were arrested, prosecuted and conviction was on male miners. The definition has so ever been drafted to recognise that there may be other persons employed by the co-board or licensed person under the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act 1946 that may meet the pardon criteria. That definition recognises that some surface employees also experience their livelihoods being directly threatened by mine closures and may have participated in or taken action in support of the strike. In fact, we know that they did and I know people myself who did that were surface employees. The policy intention is to capture the persons who worked underground in a coal mine at the surface of the coal mine and at the larger workshops located out with coal mines that are used to maintain and repair mining equipment machinery. You can draw a line about people whose livelihoods were directly related and under threat because of the strike. The definition would also cover female employees who met the pardon criteria. However, we are not aware of any robust evidence to suggest that any female was convicted in Scotland for offences related to the strike. That is why we have come to that conclusion. We think that miners are most directly affected, and not least because of the poor quality of the evidence that is still available, records and so on. To extend it further, it would be problematic and we think that we have struck the right balance in relation to that. However, as I have said before, we will listen to representations. I think that one of the things that we did here is that it might be difficult to establish us exact numbers of other people involved. When we spoke to the retired police officers, they could not recall anybody who would be outside the current definition criteria, and when we spoke to the miners themselves, they suggested that there would possibly be some, but they might again be a limited number, so I do understand that there are difficulties with establishing a number, but at the same time it might be quite a small number and it might be very important and significant for those people, if that could be included, but I hear and take on board the points that you have made. My second question for the cabinet secretary, convener, is about the compensation aspect. We have heard quite a wee bit about that as well, and I wanted to ask the cabinet secretary what his thoughts are on compensation for individual miners that have maybe lost out through the, you know, they have maybe been dismissed or whatever, because of the arrest. What is the cabinet secretary's thoughts on that? First of all, I think that the pardon, both since those who have called for it, including one of our former members, Neil Findlay and others, was about reconciliation. I am not trying to say that Neil Findlay's views on compensation might not be different from mine, but I think that the rationale for this coming forward is about the reconciliation, which I spoke about in response to my answer to Alexander Stewart. I believe that a compensation scheme, first of all, would not be consistent with the proposal for miners to self-assess the eligibility for pardon. He would have to have a much more stringent process if people were applying for compensation, and given the lack of records and so on, that would be problematic for quite a number of individuals who have evolved. It also runs the risk of the bill moving away from its intended symbolic effect and into the territory of questioning decisions by the judiciary at the time, and just to make clear that we are not doing that, we are not quashing any convictions, we don't have the ability to look back in time, assemble the evidence and do that in any event. Also, a compensation scheme runs the risk of creating a precedent for pardons that are granted in the future. Other legislation for pardoning convictions such as the historical sexual offences, pardons and disregard act of 2018 did not offer compensation, and therefore there is a risk of legal challenge. The other point that I would make is that employment and industrial relations are reserved to the UK, so to the extent that if the compensation is looking to compensate for loss of earnings, loss of pension and loss of other rights, Scottish Government wasn't employer, wasn't party to dispute, wasn't in existence at the time, and the issues that it touches on are employment issues that are for the UK Government to consider. We have and will continue to press the UK Government to hold a full public inquiry, and that is the place where those kind of issues should be discussed or addressed. For us, we think that pardon is a reasonable measure to try to introduce some reconciliation in communities that were driven apart during the strike. Thank you, cabinet secretary. You will be aware that at the roots of the bill, initially, I was and still am, of course, sympathetic to the issue of compensation for minors, but I have come to the conclusion through the evidence and hearing what you have said there that the bill remains sympathetic to compensation that it is not the place of this bill to do that, and that it could potentially hold up the bill in the pardon that the minors need. I will join you as an MSP for a mining community, and I hope that the whole committee will, in pushing the UK Government to do more. You are absolutely right that, given where employment law lies, any compensation issue should be taken there, but I am satisfied with what you said today. I would not want that bill, which is so needed in the communities around Scotland, to be delayed, but I remain sympathetic to those minors who have missed out on so much receiving the right compensation. I have listened carefully to the cabinet secretary's answer to the previous question, but I would like to ask a bit more about that, in particular the public inquiry. I understand that it is the Government's view that a public inquiry would have to be UK-wide, given that trade union laws and employment laws are reserved, as you have described, but having read the public consultation and also heard the evidence from minors and also from police and others who were involved in the strike, the information that we got from minors and the information that we got from police did not really add up. I feel like that probably needs a little bit more exploration to look at the nature of how the strike was policed. Of course, that is a devolved matter. Even prior to devolution, regional policing was in operation and decisions on strikes in this area were taken in Scotland in regional forces. What is your view on holding a public inquiry in the aspects of the strike that were and are devolved responsibilities? I think that it would be consistent with my previous answer, which was that the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament did not exist at that time. In your point about the fact that policing was not devolved at that time, one of the allegations was, for example, that a cabinet sub-committee had a reference to the way that the policing of the strike should happen in Scotland. I do not know the exact terms, but it is around the fact that the Secretary of State for Scotland was asked a cabinet to ensure that it was policed in the same way that the rest of the UK was, which goes to one of the accusations made at the time that there was political direction in terms of the policing of the strike. There are also allegations in relation to whether security services were involved, whether phone tapping was involved as well. We are in no position to examine those things. It is not within the competence of the Scottish Parliament to do that. I think that in trying to do it without that evidence, we would undermine the calls that I have made and that no others have made. My predecessors have made for the UK Government to hold an inquiry. When I wrote to the UK Government in relation to this recently, I said that the very process of us having this bill and highlighting this will increase pressure for that proper public inquiry to happen now. I know that that can seem like a far-on hope sometimes with the UK Government, but it has recently, at last, agreed to have an inquiry into the treatment of people convicted of homosexual offences on the armed forces before 2020-2000. It is possible to achieve that, and I think that that is where our focus should be, because those are the people, those are the agencies that have that evidence. To the point that you say that policing is now devolved, I have already mentioned the extent to which those policing records are sometimes very good reasons, because that is the process of what is called the 40-20 rule in the 70-30 rule of 40-20. I think that it is when you achieved the age of 40, and it has been 20 years since the conviction in the police destroyed the records. If it was more serious when you achieved the age of 70, and it has been 30 years since the conviction that you destroyed the records. We do not have the records to look at that in the way that would be suggested, the rigor that a public inquiry should bring, but on the outstanding questions about the policing of the strike and how it was managed and the political aspects of the strike, I believe that the right focus for that is the UK Government, and I will continue to be my focus in that direction. Thank you, cabinet secretary. I am not sure that I think that the two could or should be mutually exclusive. I think that there is still some questions that need to be asked, particularly in Scotland, and I think that it could be helpful for us to do both. I was interested at your opening statement when you said that the bill does not seek to apportion blame, which I find slightly at odds with pardoning something to not necessarily apportion blame. I also think that it links to the point about compensation. I would be keen to know what are your views on the way that the strike was policed at the time? Obviously, I have my own experience of watching it contemporaneously, and I was never on a pick-at-line. I am pretty sure that there was a student in 1884 who was involved in demonstrations and certainly supporting activities. I remember that there was a lot of activity among students and community groups to help in a welfare basis with minors and so on. Like everyone else at that time, I saw the pictures coming in from Orgreave, for example, where the policing, to me, seemed inconsistent with the policing methods that were happening in Scotland. I think that distinction sometimes is still there. If you look at COP26 recently, if you look at the policing of the aftermath of the Sarah Everard, the conviction that followed that, policing in Scotland followed a different path even then. However, the allegations that were around at the time, for example, that officers didn't have numbers on their tunics and so on, and there was a lot of grievance because it was a very tense height and time. I remember that, Bilston, Glen, and all the different mines where there were issues. However, what we are trying to do is to say that that was a time of height and tension. It was very difficult for the police as well. They hadn't been put into that situation before, so I don't have enough evidence to make a judgment on what the policing was or where it fell down. What we do, though, is that minors were trying to defend their communities, their way of life, their livelihoods, and that led to some of the situations that happened on Pickettlands. For that reason, we are trying to see if we can bring some reconciliation to those communities. If you like some comfort to those minors who are convicted, I have had that conviction hanging around them for quite some time, so that is what the purpose of the bill is. I am not trying to pretend that it is trying to do anything else, and there are good reasons why I don't think that we should try to do the job that should be done by the UK Government, because we don't have the facility to do that. We don't have the records and we don't have the competence in terms of the Parliament to look at some of those issues. I am returning to one of the previous questions where you were asked about the travelling to a Pickett, or to participate in it. I am interested in the point that you make about women and convictions of women at the time. I wonder if, in looking at a broader scope for the bill and supporting some of the people who had convictions for things, it was not about going to a Pickettland, but perhaps collecting for the strike fund or participating in another way. It could be another way in which women who were involved at the time may also be able to be pardoned. I think that it would be interesting to broaden it from the perspective of there will be a lot of people who right now will look back and think that I would like to have student solidarity with them. I am one of them. I was very young at the time when I heard about the strikes and I knew about them and there was a topic of conversation. I feel like if we broaden it, we are able to say to people that it is okay to stand in solidarity with people and that you won't have to experience what they experienced as well. It is quite important that we look at broadening it out. I know that Unite and Aslef have both made that suggestion. What is your view on how we could try to involve some of the activity that took place that was not about travelling to Pickettlines or on the Pickettline? I think that it is probably just as I said previously, although there is not if you like an exclusion of women because we do not have any evidence of any female being convicted. It is certainly not for the qualifying criteria. I do not think that we have much evidence beyond that. I think that the figure of 5 per cent out of all the convictions that we are aware of relates to those that would not come into the qualifying criteria, but I will maybe ask Elaine to come in in relation to that. I do think that there is a danger that it is quite closely and it must be the same, I would imagine, the same rationale that the independent review group on which we had people like John Scott and Dennis Caravan. I think that the rationale for that is that the more you make it spread out more widely where you are able to get less and less evidence to support that, the less value the pardon itself has. I think that that is my thinking, but I do not know if you want to come in on the figures, Elaine, if you have got them. I am sure that I saw one where we showed 95 per cent of the convictions of 5 per cent were for those offences, not covered by the ones that we are saying are qualifying offences, but maybe not. We can provide the committee with that evidence in due course, whether that is a thinking behind it. Yes, that is correct. We have information from Hansard where data was provided in response to parliamentary questions. There is a snapshot of data taken in the first three months of the strike, where a question was asked about how many people who were not minors have been arrested. As the cabinet secretary said, at that point, for those three months, 5 per cent were not minors. They were students, unemployed people, bus drivers, teachers and a mixture of occupations, but that was in terms of arrests. We do not know if those arrests led to convictions. As I said, we only have that three-month snapshot. We do not know if that trend continued for the rest of the strike. It is very difficult to know to have any kind of evidence base as to how many non-minors were convicted as a result of participating in the strike. I thank the cabinet secretary for the whole meeting so far. I found it really interesting. I found it quite interesting over the past few weeks as we have been scrutinising it. As others have said, it is certainly thrown up those memories of back in the day of watching those images on TV. I was moved and I am sure that the committee was moved by some of the testimonies that we have heard. There was one in particular from a Robert Young who told the committee that he was arrested multiple times and personally dismissed by the co-board following the strike. He said that people have to remember the psychological side of the minor strike. You have to understand the effect that it was having on people. A minor Alex Bennett, who was heavily involved in the strike, led to his arrest and a fine from the courts and eventually dismissed him from his job. The psychological scars of the strike are still felt to this day and some of that relates to the atmosphere of the time. It is important that we remember that impact on those. Not just those but people around them, people directly affected and indirectly affected in the whole community. The pardon, in part, is an official validation for the struggles that the minors face. I agree with my colleague Fulton, who was saying that, if we start looking into other aspects such as compensation, it might delay the pardon somewhat. I would like to ask the cabinet secretary what more could be done—I know that that might be slightly out of your remit—while you have been looking at the bill, what could be done outwith or alongside the pardon to ensure that full recognition of the struggles is recognised and never forgotten, and should we be calling on anyone else to take some responsibility, too? I think that more can be done, and I am more than happy to listen to any suggestions that the committee and its members have in relation to that, and they have made some already. I think that there will be attendant publicity as this bill progresses. The committee deliberations when it goes to the chamber and hopefully when it is passed as well. That will bring some additional awareness across the country. I also hope that it would give some heart to those in Wales and England who are in a similar position to see what is being done here. I have already mentioned the idea that we might be able to try and see if we can write out as many people as we can legitimately identify and go beyond that where it is possible to do that. I am more than happy to commit to give further thought to what else we can do to try and address the psychological, the really scarring effects of this strike, and the scarring effects on individuals from having a conviction, especially when, for momentum, this will be the only conviction that I have ever had. It never looked to get in trouble with the police at any other stage of their lives. If we can maximise the impact of doing this, and I am certainly open to suggestions as to how we do that, I think that you are right about the compensation. You have to remember what that means for individuals if they have to go through a compensation route for those who are still alive rather than get an automatic pardon. It is important that we focus on that. On your last point, yes, I think that that is the point that I have tried to make, that we will continue to put pressure on the UK Government not to blame the current members that are there for things that happened in the 1980s, but they have a responsibility as that Government to address some of the issues that are concerned. We have said that consistently and will continue to say that to the UK Government. Thank you. Thank you, convener. Good morning, cabinet secretary and officials. We have been told that, because the minus strike was so long ago, there was lack of evidence. Therefore, the automatic pardon was the way forward best course of action. Given that evidence is so scarce, and would you agree that, somewhat being cautious to suggest that the easiest way is to list the offences that should not fall under the pardon, then actually do those that do? Of course, the fact that more violent crimes were not written off by the fine is reassuring. However, would you agree that, by only listing the offences not included in the pardon, it would leave the pardon open-ended and open to interpretation? I certainly think that it is problematic, because it might surprise some people to find that the list of offences that are not listed are much greater than the ones that are, so we would have to do a much longer list to say which ones are not subject to the pardon. That approach would only work if the Parliament reminded it to favour a blanket pardon with very limited exceptions. As things stand, as I said, there are three qualifying offences, but five per cent cover a number of other offences, including vandalism, assault, possession of an offensive weapon, carless driving, etc. We could set out the offences not to be included, but it is easier not least given the fact that we have defined who is a miner and that it is miners that we are seeking to address here to specifically say which offences are being pardoned. I just think that that is a more clear-cut approach for the public to understand and for the miners themselves that are concerned by this, if that is the question that you are asking. Yes, cabinet secretary. Obviously, we have heard from miners and it is heartbreaking listening to what happened at that time, but we have also heard from police officers at that time. Today is about miners, yes, what we are talking about, but we are also looking at what the law was. Not everybody actually obeyed by the law for different circumstances and I could not possibly sit here and go back and say what was right and wrong, but we are basically looking at the law as well, that the law was there to help as well, so it was not always there to hinder and looking back, we need to make sure that we are respecting those police officers as well that did get injured at that time of no fault of their own. I think that that is what I am trying to say, that there is no loophole in this. I agree that this legislation should go forward, but we are also making sure that those who were injured, we are making sure that we are looking out for them as well. In relation to injuries and other aspects, the retired police officers association and the police pension fund has got a responsibility, as are others like the police federation, to look after its members and that they will do that very effectively. I think that the partners of the miners, they lost often all of that, they had no pension fund if they were dismissed from the job, I am not sure about their pension, but it is certainly the list of employment rights. I think that you are right to say that there are some things like a serious assault on somebody, we are not looking to pardon, we have made that clear. The distinction between this pardon and the historical sexual offences one is that what we were saying there, I think that what the Parliament was saying there is that that was a category of offences which were wrong. The whole category of offences breaks people's human rights. We are not saying that in relation to that, we are not saying that the body of law that was brought to bear or the justice system itself, we are not saying that that was wrong. We are not in a position to say that it was wrong, we do not have the evidence or the ability to go back in time, but there was not the fundamental systematic undermining of people's human rights as there was with human rights. Given that is the case, we are not looking to quash any convictions, we are not doing that in relation to this, we are providing a pardon because of the exceptional circumstances. You are right, there are some offences which would have had implications, sometimes serious implications for individual police officers, you will have heard that evidence from the Retired Police Officers Association, and that is another reason for the approach that we are taking, I think. Convener, first of all thank you very much for allowing me to take part in this morning's evidence session, I really appreciate it. Cabinet Secretary, I have a couple of questions, some of which reflect on what you have already told us, but for example did I hear you say earlier on that those convicted of an offence under the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act 1875 will now be included in the pardon? There are some categories, I will be getting the officials to come back in that, so we are saying that there have been calls for those kinds of offences to be included in the scope, although again it is worth pointing out that the independent review group did not make that specific recommendation, so I conviction under that act could cover a wide spectrum of behaviour relating to attempting without legal authority to compel another person to support the strike or not go to work, so for example the use of violence to intimidate another person or a family that is not going to be covered. It could also cover behaviour such as persistently following someone else on the way, I know we discussed this previously from place to place, we are not looking to cover that. It could also cover watching or, as I have said, besetting a house and just add to the fact that the lack of surviving police and court records make it difficult to confirm the exact circumstances that give rise to any offence in the 1875 act committed during the strike, such as a degree of violence so that malice is attached. That is why we are taking the position we are at. I do not know if you want to come in and say anything in addition to that, Elaine. That is why it is not covered, sorry. It is not covered. I think that most people accept that if there are public assaults involved, they are not included in the pardon, but I think that this act and I think that only a handful of people in Scotland were convicted under this act is about encouraging people to take part in strike action, which seems to me to be directly related to the activities around the strike, which, in my view, ought to be covered. I am sure that we shall debate that as the bill goes through Parliament. One of the other things that you mentioned earlier on, and again, keep me right on this, because I was obviously wrong on the first one, was that I think that you said that in relation to answers to questions about community-based convictions, which are currently excluded. You did say something about going through communities, which reminds me of a case of one of your constituents, Jim Taney, who was convicted, arrested and then convicted in Alor Sheriff Court for allegedly throwing a missile working minors bus outside Fish Cross Minors welfare. He was convicted, but disputes and has got evidence to support his disputation of that. Are you saying that you are willing to accept that in a case like that, that could be covered by the pardon? I do not know enough for the details about the case. I know that the Fish Cross Minors welfare, which is no longer called that very well, is related to the story about things being thrown at my car. There were snowballs, and that was a different context, and I am familiar with Alor Sheriff Court. We cannot go into that, because I have explained already. We cannot go back. Although, if what you are saying about Mr Taney is correct, there are other levels and avenues of redress, which can be taken forward by him in relation to that, and that is the best way to do that through the judicial system. However, no, what we are saying is that somebody travelling through a community on the way to a demonstration or to the picket line or to the work that is included. To make sure that I seem to have caused some confusion with my previous answer, it may be me that was wrong rather than yourself, we may get to Elaine to just be specific on that, but I can just add for your own information that you said and you were right that there were very few convictions, 16 convictions that we know of in Scotland under the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act. Prosecutions, according to the records that we know about, solely have taken place within Strathclyde region. At the time of the strike, the maximum penalty was £50 or £3 months in prison, and we do not know what the disposals were. I do not know if you want to add to anything that clarifies that. It is specifically in relation to travelling through where we are covering that and where we are not covering that. Yes, thank you. Just to be clear that the pardon covers conduct at a picket line but also for marches, demonstrations and rallies, those could have taken place in the community. Therefore, any convictions for a demonstration that took place in the community would be covered. The other point is that travel to or from such an event like a rally if it happened in a community. A lot of us have heard the story of the bus load of minors that was stopped on the A8, for example, and everyone was made to go off the bus and they were all arrested. That kind of scenario would be covered if they were on their way to a demonstration somewhere else. There are certain convictions that took place within a community that are covered by the bill. I do not think that it is fair to say that it is only the picket lines, because it is not. I am aware of Mr Tierney's story and there is a strong sense of injustice there for Mr Tierney and the other gentlemen who were arrested alongside him at that particular incident. However, as we have said, it is very difficult. Once you move away from collective situations such as demonstrations, rallies and picket lines, it becomes quite difficult to be sure that motivations for certain conduct was at one individual against another. That pardon is a collective pardon and it is aimed at areas where minors were acting collectively in support of the strike. I know that there will be points raised about blanket pardons and where you draw the line or if there should be any line. However, as the cabinet secretary has said, there are very good reasons for why the criteria in the bill are as they are. The lack of records makes it very difficult for any assessment to be made of the circumstances that gave rise to any of those convictions, whether on a picket line or elsewhere. Therefore, the feeling is that it is important that we pardon the minors collectively for what happened during the dispute. Related to that is another point. Again, the cabinet secretary mentioned the eastern villages in Fylin and Plin, for example, which were a flashpoint in the strike back in 1984-85. Evidence given to the Scotland inquiry was that, if you take, for example, the village of Fylin, which is where Paul May's colliery was, the minors at Paul May were 100 per cent out, so there was no question of there being a need to take action to discourage people from going into the pit. However, it is reported in the Scotland inquiry that there was a very heavy police presence, nonetheless, in the community that led to tensions in the community and that led to arrests and subsequent convictions in the community. Do you think that there is a case to extend the scope to understand that this was a dispute that was not just conducted at the gates of the colliery or even on demonstrations, but it was a dispute that was conducted in communities as well? I think that there is no question that it was. It has an impact on communities and, for one reason, I should mention the fact that we have launched and have publicised this pardon at Fylin at the outside outdoors minors museum, which I am familiar with, has been for many years. However, just as you have said, even if there are 100 per cent out and there is heavy police presence and arrests emerge from that, they will be pardoned by this. They will have been at that demonstration, wherever it takes place in the community. If there is a demonstration or if there is something on the picket line, then those things should be captured by the qualifying criteria that we have. I am generally not aware of any instance of somebody in Fylin that might have been convicted for reasons that are outwith the qualifying criteria of the pardon. I have given the reasons why we think that we should restrict it in that way. I think that it also makes it a more meaningful pardon for those to whom it will apply, but I am not aware of it. It may be because you will know yourself that there is quite a lot of secondary picketing that went on as well, so people from one community would go to another to support them as well. However, what we are saying is that I think that it is legitimate and it is for the best of reasons. It is restricted to minors and it is restricted to those qualifying offences, and that will include in Fylin being at the picket line or being in a demonstration in the community. I accept that you are not aware of any convictions in Fylin in that context, but you are aware of the conviction of Jim Taney, for example, who is one of your own constituents in your constituency. The final area, I just wanted to probe a little bit more, and we have heard members of the committee say that they are not in favour of a compensation scheme. Well, I am in favour of a compensation scheme, and the reasons to me are pretty straightforward, because we know, again, if I quote the Scott inquiry, that there was an element of arbitrary application of the criminal law by the police, prosecutors and the sheriffs, so there was an inherent injustice there that they have found. They also spoke about dismissals being disproportionate, excessive and unreasonable. In a previous evidence session to this committee, the former Lothians police officer, Tom Wood, said that, in his opinion, the dismissals represented extrajudicial punishment. He thought that this is a former serving police officer who policed the strike. He thought that the actions of the coal board were spiteful and excessive, and he mentioned all grief. However, when we look at the figures in Scotland, he was twice as likely to be arrested as he was in any other part or in any other coal field, in any other part of the UK. He was three times as likely to be dismissed as anywhere else in the UK. People have spoken about the then national coal board area director, Albert Wheeler, conducting almost an event debtor. Anybody who was convicted was automatically dismissed in other areas of the national coal board. That was not the case. There was a mood of reconciliation at the time in 1985, and people returned to their jobs. Do you see that there is a Scottish dimension here? The Scottish dimension is one that needs to be addressed. There has been psychological and emotional scarring. Family lives have changed forever as a result of what happened, including what happened to those people who were convicted and then dismissed. We have spoken about women not being included in those convicted. That might be true, but many women who were married to minors, who were daughters of minors and who had relationships with minors were condemned by those decisions and suffered huge hardship as a result of that. Do you not at least accept that there is a principle there that there ought to be some compensation? You may say that it could be paid at a UK level rather than as part of this bill. Members have spoken about a delay. It seems to me that if you set out the principles in the bill, it would be possible to address that. It has been done in other instances where there have been injustices and the Scottish Government has decided to address those. Where do you stand on the principle of compensation? Surely you understand the arguments about the impact that this dispute has had and the injustices that were perpetrated on the minors and their communities, but also on their families? I understand that. As I say, I was very much a follower of what happened during the strike in some detail. I was well aware of the communities both where I lived and where I worked and the impact of not just the minors but the families and the entire community, so I am well aware of that. My point is that the way that dismissals were carried out—quite a few reinstatements afterwards in Scotland as well—probably would be higher because they had higher numbers proportionally of dismissals in the first place. However, those were dismissals by an employer, the national co-board, which applied across the UK. They relate to employment law, which is reserved to the UK. If there is a case for compensation and I am not quibbling with anything that has been said about the loss that was endured by people, it is sometimes very hard to quantify because it is so huge. That is for the organisation that was the state at the time, they were the authority at the time, they have the reserve powers to look at employment legislation, they have the powers to look into wider issues about the policing, about the extent of political involvement in the policing. We do not have those powers. I think that for us to try and introduce some kind of compensation scheme, apart from delaying, as has been mentioned by one or two members already, the potential pardon itself, we do not have either a legislative competence to deal with that in terms of getting all the facts around employment and so on or the ability to get all the information that is necessary. That is why I am not sure why somebody would want to oppose the idea that the UK Government should be held to account for that. It has the ability to look at it and it has the ability to get the records. Such records still exist and to question things like if there is any substance to the intelligence services being involved, they can do that. We cannot do that. That is why I take the position that if there is to be one, it would be for the UK Government to consider and to give my commitment that I will continue on behalf of the Scottish Government to call upon the UK Government to hold that full public inquiry that could cover the issues that you have mentioned. Thank you, convener. It was really just to make a point of clarification on my friend and colleague Richard Leonard's last point, and I want to put on record my thanks to Richard for all that he has done for mining communities. I know that he is a big supporter of communities. However, he said there that other members, one of whom I had talked about, were not in favour of compensation. I just want to make my point clear for any miners or mining communities watching me. I am very much in favour of compensation. What I am saying is having heard the evidence from miners and others, and also from the cabinet secretary, that I am now convinced that this bill is not the place where a compensation scheme would be based and that it would not suit the purpose of this bill. In fact, what we heard from miners in our private session was that they are very much aware of the purpose and scope of the bill and are content with that. I wanted to put that on the record that it would not be fair to say that I am not for a compensation scheme. I just do not think that it should be in this bill. I do not think that there is a question in the air, cabinet secretary, so we can go to Maggie Chapman. Thanks, Joe. Just a follow-up, if I may, cabinet secretary. In response to my earlier question, you talked about some of the reasons for not extending the scope to certain aspects of community tensions. I have just been thinking and listening to your answers to my colleagues. Now when we accept that this bill is about a pardon, it is not about quashing convictions, so what is the harm? You talked about it, but it would set precedence elsewhere. We are not talking about quashing convictions here. We are talking about a recognition of the wider, as you said, the recognition of circumstances that were different to normal functioning of society. Can you say a little bit more about that setting of precedents and why it is, given that it is not about quashing convictions, the consequence of that? I am not sure that I quite understand that link, given that it is a pardon, not a quash. I think that it is really around the idea of being as relevant to what we are discussing as it is possible to be, so that is why we look at the miners who are most directly affected by it, and that is why we look at the offences where that point about the exceptional circumstances on a picket line when your community is under threat and your job is under threat and the industry itself is under threat. We are trying to recognise the particular circumstances of that. If you go to other potential offences and convictions, you have much less ability to say what the motive was there, to say what was the circumstance behind that. We do not have the records to do that, and if we did that, you could be pardoning things that include serious assaults on people or intimidation on people. I would say that there are very few, but it is possible to do that, and that is why we think that it is the right way to say that the miners were most directly affected and were most directly affected on the picket lines in defence of their jobs and their communities, and we understand that what happened then was extremely unusual, extraordinary. I think Alexander Stewart has made the point that this is probably the most divisive strike any of us can remember in terms of its longer term consequences, so we are trying to recognise that. To go wider than that makes it very problematic for the reasons that I have said, so it is a judgment, as I said before, and it is a judgment that we are making in relation to this. Cabinet Secretary, one of the officials, perhaps, should just maybe answer what the scope is for someone in a position like Jim Tierney who feels that they are not caught by this pardon but nonetheless feel that an injustice was done as part of the strike and what scope for them to seek redress. There is obviously the criminal appeal route, which is available now and would have been available at the time as well, but I think that we probably need to be slightly realistic about the fact that, with the number of years that I have gone by pursuing an appeal now, it would be difficult because if it is on the merits, if it is on the facts of what took place, then the details relating to that and the evidence has now most likely been lost. I have seen some of the material relating to Mr Tierney, and I saw part of the interview with him on Twitter. I think that at the moment in terms of his relationship to the pardon scheme he has two problems. One of them certainly is that it does not seem that this offence happened either at a picket or demonstration or something similar or while he was travelling to or from. I am also not completely clear from the information that I have seen what offence it was that he was convicted of. If it was breach of the peace, which it could have been by throwing a stone, then that is on the list, but I do not know whether, in fact, it may have been something else. There are other possibilities that I think throwing a stone at a boss could have been charged at, so I think that we have probably got a bit of a lack of information there at the moment. However, there are still individual appeal routes available. They may well not turn out to be profitable to follow at this point in time rather than decades ago. If that is not a realistic prospect, then it is a question of whether the scope of the pardon is wide enough and that is a judgment call. The reasons why it has been created, the way in which it has been created, I think that the cabinet secretary has fully set out. Thank you. Any other members who have any final questions? Thank you very much. That ends our session. Thanks very much, cabinet secretary, and to both officials for giving evidence today. We now move into private session.