Hansard

I refer colleagues to my entry in the register of members’ interests.

I begin by expressing my heartfelt thanks to all the people who are involved in supporting and advocating on behalf of survivors and victims of all forms of violence and those who witness such violence. Structural inequalities and intersectional layers of oppression mean that far too many people are still subjected to abuses of power that cause life-changing—and, sometimes, life-ending—physical and mental harm. Too many of those people go on to be retraumatised by a system that should provide solace, compassion and justice. We should not accept that as inevitable.

We often hear of the mind-blowing resilience of survivors and witnesses and of the mutual support that they can give one another when adequate resources allow for safe and confidential sharing of stories where they are believed and not judged. We should be truly grateful to all those who provide such safe spaces and support victims, survivors and witnesses, often putting their own wellbeing at risk. Vicarious trauma is real. Workers who support victims, survivors and witnesses of violence are subjected to the risk of vicarious trauma every day. Those workers do phenomenally important work and are incredibly resilient.

However, we should not have to rely on the resilience of individuals. There is nothing inevitable about the violence that leads to trauma. It is a consequence of often intersecting inequalities. It is a direct result of imbalances of power. Therefore, our justice system should ensure that it does not reinforce such imbalances of power in any element of its operation. That is why this debate and the bill and wider trauma-informed justice framework that we are discussing today are so important.

I put on record my thanks to the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs and, especially, to her predecessor, Keith Brown, for their determination to introduce the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill and their commitment to achieving that.

At its heart, the bill seeks to reorient our justice system towards compassion and care and to put victims, survivors and witnesses at its centre, with a trauma-informed approach embedded throughout.

Trauma is complex and multifaceted. It incorporates both the experience of actual physical or emotional harm or threat and the whole context of that event or series of events and circumstances. It is contained in both the immediate experience of harm or threat and the longer-term repercussions of that harm or threat, even if far removed or detached from it. As one person put it when contributing to the significant work that has brought us to today, trauma

“isn’t just the event, the trauma is the whole process of the event, what comes after, whether that’s police interview or court case or whatever. So people shouldn’t dismiss their part in that.”

The cabinet secretary and other members have already outlined how much needs to change in our system to ensure that we do not, however inadvertently, compound the injustices that victims, survivors and witnesses face, because any retraumatisation is an injustice in itself.

I hope that the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill will help to address some of the current issues. On behalf of the Scottish Greens, I welcome whole-heartedly the aim of the bill to treat with compassion victims, survivors, witnesses and other vulnerable parties during their journeys throughout a reformed, trauma-informed justice system.

I am very pleased to see, at last, proposals to protect victims and survivors of sexual and some other offences through an automatic lifelong right of anonymity. Similarly, I welcome the commitment to abolish the not proven verdict. Although that is one of the things that marks out as different the Scottish legal system, it is clear that it has been disproportionately applied in crimes of a sexual nature—35 per cent in trials for rape or attempted rape compared with just 17 per cent in other cases. In line with our rights-based approach to policy making, it is right that we give the survivors and, indeed, perpetrators of those crimes the clarity of a binary verdict option: guilty or not guilty.

Scottish Greens have long called for proper support for witnesses and complainers, and I am pleased that the bill proposes an automatic right to state-funded independent legal representation for witnesses and complainers when applications are made to lead evidence of their sexual history in sexual offence cases. However, that does not go far enough. I welcome the Labour amendment on the issue. I hope that, during the forthcoming discussion of the bill, we can push the ILR proposal further.

I welcome the establishment of a specialist sexual offences court. Like other members, I welcome the important shift in approach for supporting children and young people through the justice system.

We have already heard about the very strong views on the proposal to pilot single-judge trials for cases of rape and attempted rape. That proposal comes directly from Lady Dorian’s report of two years ago and follows calls from survivors and their support organisations. It is controversial and is a marked departure from the status quo, but, given how the system is failing, such a departure may be necessary. I will follow the issue with interest as the bill is scrutinised in the coming months.

Other elements in the bill and the wider framework also seek to transform, but I will raise a notable issue that was not included: the abolition of the corroboration that is another distinctive feature of the Scottish system. I thank Speak out Sisters and others for their engagement on the issue and am sure that those conversations will continue.

In closing, I pay tribute to the efforts of the many campaigners, activists, counsellors, advocacy workers, legal professionals and others who have worked tirelessly to ensure that our justice processes can better serve victims and witnesses. I thank the many survivors, victims and families who have shared their experiences in order to improve the justice system. This legislation, and the associated justice framework, testify to their hard work and I hope that we can do them justice in the coming months.