Meeting of the Parliament 08 May 2024
Scottish Labour will support the amendment to the business motion, because we believe that there should be a statement from the Lord Advocate, and I want to say why. There is emerging evidence that the Crown Office knew or ought to have known that the Horizon system was questionable, and we still do not have answers on that.
We obviously need to see the details of the bill, but we will support any attempts to overturn convictions. However, it will not be enough for victims simply to have their convictions overturned. In fact, in the Sheriff Appeal Court this week, there were six cases in which it was deemed that the Horizon evidence was not corroboration, so those cases were overturned. Victims will want accountability for the full timeline in relation to who took decisions and why better decisions were not made, because what happened resulted in the prosecutions in the first place. I think that victims would want a statement followed by detailed questions and answers.