Hansard

Our second continued petition is PE1855, which is on pardoning and memorialising those convicted under the Witchcraft Act 1563. The petition has been lodged by Claire Mitchell QC, and at this point I must, on behalf of the committee, apologise to her. There was an oversight, in that appropriate notice was not given about the petition coming back to the committee this morning, and the opportunity to submit further evidence to us was therefore lost. I think that, later in the proceedings, we will be seeking to keep the petition open, and we therefore look forward to receiving that submission. PE1855 calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to pardon, apologise and create a national monument to memorialise those people in Scotland accused and convicted as witches under the 1563 act. We last considered the petition at our meeting on 1 September 2021, when we decided to seek further information from the Scottish Government and the petitioner on whether the royal prerogative of mercy could be used to achieve a pardon. The petitioner seeks three things—a pardon, an apology and a national memorial for those convicted under the 1563 act—and further detail on all of that has been provided to colleagues in their papers. In relation to the pardon, the petitioner suggests that the royal prerogative of mercy is not a suitable vehicle for achieving the petition’s aim, stating that “we are not looking for a pardon in individual cases by the Queen” as “The prosecutions were carried out by the Scottish State.” The petitioner also states that an application to the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission to pardon individual people would not be competent as there would be “no-one that could be considered to have a ‘legitimate interest’ in terms of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995”, given the fact that centuries have passed since these events happened. Instead, the petitioner suggests there is a need for the Scottish Government “to legislate to provide a pardon for all those convicted.” The petitioner draws parallels with the Historical Sexual Offences (Pardons and Disregards) (Scotland) Act 2018, which provided “a collective and posthumous pardon.” The petitioner suggests that the committee should ask the Scottish Government “to provide a public apology to those convicted of witchcraft, making it clear that those convictions ought not to have happened and that these people were not witches.” In its submission of 4 November 2021, the Scottish Government accepts that “while the SCCRC can consider posthumous applications made on behalf of a convicted person ... by someone who would have standing to bring an appeal on their behalf, in practice, this will almost certainly not be possible”. In terms of the royal prerogative of mercy, the Scottish Government advises that “the First Minister will not generally consider recommending to Her Majesty a free pardon under the RPM process until the person’s appeal against their conviction has been dismissed, or leave to appeal has been refused, and any application to the SCCRC seeking to have the case referred to the Appeal Court has been rejected.” In a further submission from the petitioner dated 5 December 2021, she suggests that the committee might wish to consider a committee bill on this topic. Since then, we have received a submission from Natalie Don MSP, who has indicated that she intends to bring forward a member’s bill to allow for a pardon to take place. However, she notes that the two other asks of the petition—that is, to seek a public apology and to create a national monument—will not fall within the scope of her bill. I hope that my microphone has been working for the past several minutes, otherwise there is a lot that I will have to repeat. On the assumption that it has been, I ask members whether they have any comments with regard to the action that might be taken.