Hansard

I know that the mood in the chamber is more sombre than usual, given events and the debate that has just taken place, but I am grateful that members have agreed to participate in this debate; their comments and thoughts will be important.

I am pleased to open the debate on redesigning the community justice system in Scotland. Reoffending is an important issue that affects everyone: it creates victims, damages communities and wastes potential. Audit Scotland has estimated the total social and economic cost of reoffending at approximately £3 billion per annum. That is why it is imperative that the arrangements that are in place to plan, manage and deliver offender services in the community maximise the potential for delivery of positive outcomes for victims, communities and offenders.

I commend the hard work of our partners in the statutory and third sectors—including in community justice, health, housing and education—in tackling reoffending over the past five years. I have seen at first hand the excellent work that is being done throughout the country.

The new community payback order has been successfully implemented, with 10,228 orders commenced between April 2011 and March 2012. As a result, 934,502 hours of unpaid work or other activity have been undertaken in communities throughout Scotland.

The whole-system approach for young people continues to be rolled out throughout Scotland, resulting in a decrease of 32 per cent in recorded crimes and offences committed by young people between 2008-09 and 2011-12. Most recently, we have invested £7.7 million in a national network of mentoring schemes, which are to be provided by partnerships between the third sector and the public sector and will target women offenders and prolific offenders who are at risk of committing more crimes. Reoffending rates are now at their lowest in more than a decade, and recorded crime is at a 37-year low.

Although all that is progress in the right direction, a series of recent reports have highlighted shortcomings in community justice and have called—understandably—for urgent action. Those included Audit Scotland’s report, “An overview of Scotland’s criminal justice system”, which was published in September 2011, and the report by the Parliament’s Public Audit Committee, which took evidence on the findings of the Audit Scotland report. Both highlighted concerns about the lack of information on the range, capacity and effectiveness of offender services, as well as about the accountability arrangements for community justice authorities.

Although there are many different bodies involved in reducing reoffending, CJAs, which were created by the Management of Offenders etc (Scotland) Act 2005, are the main bodies responsible for setting the direction and priorities on reducing reoffending in their geographical areas. CJAs are not directly accountable to Scottish ministers or to local authorities, although we monitor how they discharge their statutory functions. Criminal justice social work in local authorities continues to provide offender services including community payback orders and services for offenders leaving prison, as well as commissioning services from the third sector.

That set-up has created a confusing picture. Indeed, the effectiveness of those arrangements was questioned in the report of the commission on women offenders—which was chaired by Dame Elish Angiolini—that was published in April 2012. It found that

“there still exist inherent barriers in the structural and funding systems for criminal justice social work, and working practices which inhibit greatly the potential to reduce reoffending.”

The report stated that CJAs

“brought an extra layer of complexity, disproportionate in a jurisdiction of five million people”.

It called for “radical reform” and the establishment of a national community justice service to plan, manage and deliver offender services in the community.

Most recently, Audit Scotland’s report “Reducing reoffending in Scotland”, which was published in November last year, said on community justice authorities:

“The way they were set up has significantly limited their effectiveness”.

Audit Scotland called for

“stronger leadership at national, regional and local level if reoffending is to be tackled effectively”.

In summary, it is evident that the status quo is no longer tenable, which is why on 20 December last year we, as a Government, published a consultation paper that set out options for redesigning the community justice system. Before I get into the detail of the issues involved, I will set out our vision of a successful community justice system.

We want a more efficient and effective system with strong and visible leadership at national and local levels, collaborative working across the public and third sectors, and robust accountability. Offender services should be built around people’s needs, based on evidence of what works and what offers best value for money. Local partnership, with the engagement and commitment of non-justice partners including housing, education and health is critical to success. Service users, their families and the wider community should be routinely involved in the planning, delivery and review of services in order to help to improve performance and outcomes. In addition, there should be a strong focus on prevention and early intervention.

We are under no illusions that structural change alone will result in transformation of the community justice system; we also need a shift in culture. At the heart of any reforms should be the development and empowerment of practitioners, managers and leaders who work with offenders in the public and third sectors. Unlike the United Kingdom coalition Government, we have no plans to outsource to the private sector the management of offenders in the community. We value highly the professional contribution of our public sector criminal justice social workers and others who work in community justice. We want to use this opportunity to reform the existing arrangements to help to make best use of their skills, knowledge and expertise.

Our vision of a reformed community justice system acknowledges the findings of the Christie commission and is consistent with our wider public service reform programme, including the integration of adult health and social care and the review of community planning partnerships. The consultation paper sets out three possible options for reform, which were developed with input from the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, the Association of Directors of Social Work and CJAs. I thank them for their assistance.

Option A is an enhanced community justice authority model, in which changes would be made to CJA membership and functions, including widening of their membership to include an appointed member of the health board, and expansion of their statutory functions to include strategic commissioning of services.

Option B is a local authority model, in which CJAs would be abolished and local authorities would assume responsibility for the strategic planning, design and delivery of offender services in the community.