Hansard

On 29 January 2009, Colin Love went for a swim beside a beautiful beach on Margarita Island in Venezuela. I have mentioned Colin previously in the chamber. He was a young man, and a keen traveller. He did not return alive to Scotland. He drowned that day. It turns out that the waters where he swam were a notorious drowning spot. There were no warning signs, no lifeguards and no guidance from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office that the area might be a dangerous destination for travellers. No dangers were raised by the travel firms involved in Colin’s carriage to Venezuela and the cruise that he was on.

There was also no fatal accident inquiry. Although I do not know whether, in that instance, there should have been one, I know that it was wrong that it was against the law to give the Lord Advocate discretion to have one if he or she saw fit.

I read about Colin’s death in the Evening Times. One of the journalists there, Caroline Wilson, has since reported on the inspirational story of Colin’s mum, Julie Love, on many occasions. Julie has campaigned tirelessly ever since Colin’s death to improve support for families who have lost loved ones overseas. That includes her campaign to allow fatal accident inquiries to be held into the deaths of Scots who die abroad—not on every occasion, but at the discretion of the Lord Advocate. Her campaign and the work of the charity Death Abroad—You’re Not Alone go far further than that, because they also focus on many ways of supporting families. If time allows, I will return to that.

I thank Caroline Wilson for a number of reasons. After reading Julie Love’s story, I arranged to meet Julie to see how I could be of assistance. In the six years since then, I have got to know her incredibly well and I am privileged to call her a friend. I initially worked with her years ago to submit evidence to the Cullen inquiry. More recently, I have supported her with her petition to the Public Petitions Committee. In both cases, she sought to extend the scope of FAIs to include the deaths of Scots overseas. Lord Cullen accepted the case that she made and, only this week, the Public Petitions Committee agreed to keep her petition open, awaiting the outcome of the Scottish Government’s Inquiries into Fatal Accidents and Sudden Deaths etc (Scotland) Bill. I am delighted that the Scottish Government, too, has accepted her proposals and that they are contained in the bill.

I understand why people get so dismayed at the time that these things take. It took six long years to get to this stage and it is understandable that people should have concerns about that. However, we are getting there and the system works—although sometimes, perhaps, it does not work as quickly as we would like it to.

I want to look in more detail at the bill’s provisions on discretionary FAIs into deaths overseas. The Lord Advocate needs to have discretion, independence and flexibility. However, how can he or she make an informed choice about when to use that discretion? When should there be post mortems when bodies are returned to Scotland? I know from meeting many families through Death Abroad—You’re Not Alone that a post mortem that has been carried out in Scotland can often tell a very different story from the post-mortem that was conducted in the country where the loved one passed away. Surely a significant contrast between one post mortem and another indicates that something is not quite right. There may be lots of provisions that can better inform the Lord Advocate, but I am trying to stress to the minister that the Lord Advocate can use such discretion only if he or she can bring an informed opinion to bear.

Will families of those who lose loved ones overseas be made aware of the provisions as a matter of course? There is a balance to be struck, because we do not want to distress families any more than is necessary. Tragedies happen—because of misadventure, because people have been unlucky or simply because of old age—and we do not want to distress families. However, where families think that something may be amiss, they must be at the centre when the Lord Advocate is informed. I ask for more information on that.

In cases where the body is not returned to Scotland, I agree that the Lord Advocate should have discretion. I know of a number of cases where bodies have not been not returned to Scotland because the families could not afford to bring them back. Indeed, some families could not save up to bring their loved one’s body back because it was costing them money to keep the body in storage overseas. A cremation was their only option, because of financial constraints. We need to bear that issue in mind.

I would like to widen the debate a little. At the start of my speech, I said that I had no idea whether Colin Love’s tragic death would have triggered a fatal accident inquiry if the bill had already been enacted. We had the bizarre situation in which we had to write to President Chávez in Venezuela to ask him to put lifeguards and signs on that beach. The travel sector did not cover itself in glory then, and I still think that it does not cover itself in glory in relation to such issues. Could a fatal accident inquiry in Colin Love’s case have driven wider change? It might have identified that the treatment of my constituent by Foreign and Commonwealth Office link workers was pretty dismal, to be frank, and that there is no consistent way of delivering messages about a death to loved ones and next of kin in Scotland when someone passes away overseas.

I have campaigned with Julie Love for a number of years for the Scottish Government, Police Scotland, Victim Support Scotland and other Scottish agencies to give better support to families whose loved ones have passed away overseas. Death Abroad—You’re Not Alone does a lot of voluntary work with goodwill, passion and commitment, but it needs more assistance. I accept that significant reserved matters are involved, but as a devolved Administration we have worked with the UK Government in partnership during the progress of the bill. Let us extend that. Let us work with Julie Love, Death Abroad—You’re Not Alone and all the partner agencies to ensure that it is not just fatal accident inquiries that we get right for people who lose loved ones overseas, but the whole system, because right now it is not working.