Meeting of the Parliament 20 May 2014
I will try to cover and respond to some of the points that have been raised in the debate.
John Wilson talked about enforcement in private car parks, and he was quite right to say that that does not fall within our jurisdiction. I have written to the Scottish Retail Consortium to highlight the importance of the issue and the need for disabled people to have close access to shops. I hope that the passing of the bill will raise retailers’ awareness of the importance of managing disabled bays in shopping centres. If necessary, I will be more than happy to write to the SRC again once the legislation has commenced.
Anne McTaggart raised the issue brought up by the Law Society of Scotland about the offence of duplication of a blue badge. It is already an offence to misuse a blue badge. By introducing an offence of using a cancelled badge, section 4 of the bill is amending the existing law to include provision that it is also an offence to drive or to park a vehicle that is displaying a badge that has been cancelled or that should have been returned to the issuing authority. I am no lawyer, but I think that it is true that we have a general presumption in law against theft, but there are many aspects of theft that we describe as an offence in law, and this is, to my mind, similar.
To return to the point that Cameron Buchanan made about being sensitive about these things, we would not expect action to be taken if a person who had previously reported their badge as having been lost then found it again and inadvertently used it instead of the replacement. The same situation would have to apply to a carer who transports a badge holder and is unlikely to be unaware that the badge holder is using a cancelled badge. It is quite right to say that we should be sensitive about such things. Every case should be treated on its own merits, which is why we are working with the agencies that are involved, including the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and the police, to ensure that guidance to local authorities is in place to allow agencies to take a pragmatic approach to enforcement.
It is not really part of this bill, but mention was made of the application for blue badges. Local authorities should and do provide assistance to those who are going through that process. It is also true to say that the code of practice gives guidance to local authorities on the application process, and it recommends that, if a person is clearly eligible and their condition is unlikely to change, the blue badge improvement service can be notified so that no independent mobility assessment will be required in the future when a person is reapplying for a badge. That is helpful to people in those circumstances. Many local authorities operate in that way.
To go back to the point about being sensitive in these cases, I note that, even if a case is referred to the procurator fiscal, it is its role, on receipt of reports about crimes from the police and other reporting agencies, to decide what action to take, including whether to prosecute someone. That step provides a further check.