Meeting of the Parliament 17 June 2026 [Last updated 18:21]
Before I come to the appointments before the Parliament today, I, too, on behalf of the Scottish Liberal Democrats, pay tribute to Dorothy Bain KC—the second woman to hold the post of Lord Advocate in our country. She was very generous with her time with me, and forgiving of my lack of understanding of the law at times. She also brought forward groundbreaking guidance, in particular as regards safe consumption rooms such as the Thistle centre, which I was fortunate enough to visit at the start of this year. That facility has saved nearly 100 lives since it opened, and I think that a lot of that is thanks to her visionary application of the guidance.
I welcome Ruth Charteris KC and Brian Gill KC to their appointments, and assure them of Liberal Democrats’ support this afternoon. These are the highest law offices in the land—it is important that we have people of calibre and respect, and both the nominees before us have those in spades.
However, I say respectfully to the Government that it is perfectly acceptable to respect the legal competence and experience of the nominees before us but to recognise that the case for reform of these offices is now unanswerable. When Dorothy Bain was appointed five years ago, the SNP recognised at the time of the election just preceding that—when it had promised to consult on reform of these offices—that having a Lord Advocate acting both as chief prosecutor and as principal legal adviser to the Government, as a full and active member of the Cabinet, presented many risks.
Those are very different skill sets, and I think that the intervening period has only reinforced and underscored the case for reform. As we have heard, England has an Attorney General to advise the Government, but a separate Director of Public Prosecutions. Similar reform has been emulated in the Republic of Ireland and, recently, in Northern Ireland.
However, I recognise that we need law officers, and we will support the appointment of the nominees before us today. There are big challenges before them both in relation to drug policy enforcement and fixing our broken fatal accident inquiry system. I congratulate them on ascending to these offices today, and we will support the motion before us.