The Scottish Conservatives are urging the SNP Government to change their current soft-touch approach to justice.
The party will lead a debate on the subject tomorrow (Wednesday) at a time when violent crime has reached its highest level in a decade and police officer numbers have dwindled to their lowest since 2008.
Despite this, the SNP Government has continued to underfund Police Scotland – handing them a real-terms capital funding cut in their latest budget.
Throughout their time in government, the SNP have tried to keep dangerous criminals out of prison by passing an effective ban on sentences of 12 months or less and automatically releasing criminals from prison when they have served just half of their sentence.
They are now planning to further water down justice and put the public at risk by releasing prisoners just a third of the way through their sentence.
Victims of crime have also suffered as a result of the SNP’s priorities, with broken promises around funding and the failure to give them a voice at parole hearings.
The Scottish Conservatives will use their party business slot to call on the SNP Government to change strategy and to finally put the victims of crime first by backing their Victims Bill.
Scottish Conservative Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Justice, Jamie Greene MSP, said: “The SNP Government have spent the last 15 years eroding our justice system with their soft-touch policies – and now, more than ever, people are feeling the consequences.
“Violent crime in Scotland has reached its highest level in a decade, the human cost of which is being felt by thousands of victims who have been let down by SNP broken promises.
“Instead of standing up for the victims of crime, the SNP Government would rather ensure that criminals are either kept out of prison completely or automatically released having served just a fraction of their sentence.
“While criminals are wrapped in cotton wool, victims are having to wait years for justice as they are passed through Scotland’s shamefully backlogged court system.
“Victims should never be treated like an afterthought in our justice system but that’s the reality under the SNP. The Scottish Conservatives would ensure that criminals are always properly punished, as well as putting victims’ needs first with our Victims Bill.”
Notes
Violent crime has risen to the highest level since Nicola Sturgeon became First Minister. In 2021-22, there were 9,842 violent crimes recorded. This is higher than any other year throughout Nicola Sturgeon’s time as First Minister. The previous high was in 2019-20, when 9,316 violent crimes were recorded. (Scottish Government, Recorded Crime in Scotland March 2022, 21 March 2022, link; Scottish Government, Recorded Crime in Scotland 2020-21, 28 September 2021, link).
Police numbers in Scotland have dropped below 17,000 for the first time since 2008. Official figures released by Police Scotland show that there were just 16,805 full time police officers employed by the service as of 31 March 2022. This is the lowest number recorded in Scotland since Q4 of 2008 where 16,675 officers were employed full-time in Scotland. (Scottish Government, Quarterly Police Strength Statistics, 3 May 2022, link).
The SNP Government now want to automatically release criminals after serving just a third of their prison sentence. The SNP Government recently published a Bail and Release from Custody Arrangements consultation which stated ‘short-term prisoners could be automatically released earlier than the half-way point of their sentence, e.g. at the 1/3 point.’ (Scottish Government, Consultation on Bail and Release from Custody Arrangements in Scotland, 15 November 2021, link).
The SNP broke their promise to rewrite Parole Board rules. Responding to a question from Scottish Conservative MSP Liam Kerr, former Justice Secretary Humza Yousaf said: ‘The Scottish Government will undertake a full rewrite of the Parole Board (Scotland) Rules 2001 this year [2021] in order to simplify and modernise them. As part of that work we intend to add a specific provision to the rules which will provide for 'failure to disclose a victim's body' as a matter, amongst others, that the Parole Board may take into account when making a decision to release.’ So far, these reforms have yet to appear in the Parole Board (Scotland) Rules. (Scottish Parliament, Written Parliamentary Question Answer S5W-35742, 12 March 2021, link; Legislation.gov, Parole Board (Scotland) Amendment Rules 2021, 7 January 2021, link; The Independent, 7 February 2022, link).
The SNP’s flagship victims fund didn’t even provide a fifth of what was promised. The SNP manifesto for the Scottish Parliament in 2016 stated: ‘We will implement the remaining provisions of the Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014, including establishing a Scottish Victims Surcharge Fund, paid for by offenders, which will provide more than a million pounds a year of funding for practical help for victims of crime.’ The SNP Government confirmed that the most recent round of funding will only provide £165,000 a year – less than a fifth of what was promised. It was not implemented until November 2019 – more than 5 years after the Victims and Witnesses Act had passed. (Scottish Government, Support for Victims, 23 March 2021, link; Scottish National Party, Manifesto 2016, 20 April 2016, link; VSS, 10 December 2021, link).
The SNP Government cut Police Scotland’s capital budget in real-terms. The Scottish Conservatives called for a £35.6 million increase in capital funding for Police Scotland to spend on upgrading police cars, stations and crime-fighting equipment. However, there is no increase at all for police capital funding – which amounts to a real-terms cut. (Scottish Government, Budget 2022-23, 9 December 2021, Page 72 & 74, link).