Hansard

I remind members of my entry in the register of members’ interests, which states that I am still a sitting councillor on Aberdeenshire Council.

On the whole, the motion that the Scottish Government has proposed today is fair, and we welcome the Government’s decision to launch a consultation. Our prison population is too high and costs too much to the public purse. Victim support is paramount and we must work together to rehabilitate offenders. Like much of what the Scottish Government promises, the motion is forward-thinking, liberal and just. However, for the moment, those are still only words on a piece of paper and that have been spoken aloud in this chamber, far from the reality of what people across Scotland face every day.

Scotland’s prisons are again operating at or near critical capacity. Some people are bunked together in, and confined for 23 hours a day in, tiny rooms that were made for one person, in a prison estate that was better suited to previous centuries. That is a serious problem for prison staff, rehabilitation, public confidence and, ultimately, public safety. However, let us be clear: the crux of the matter is that the crisis did not happen overnight, and we need to nail this dragging issue together.

I am a newly elected member—I share that characteristic with more than 60 other members across the Parliament, including some members in the Government. We have come here with fresh ideas, renewed enthusiasm and close ties to the communities that we represent. I share progressive liberal values on this issue as well as on many others with many members across the Parliament, regardless of party affiliation. Therefore, I ask those members to listen and be bold enough to agree.

I say again that the crisis did not appear overnight; the Scottish Government has known for years that prison numbers were rising. Although we welcome action, we are left wondering why that action is, yet again, reactive instead of proactive. The Scottish Government knew that courts were recovering from the pandemic backlog and that more serious cases were progressing through the justice system. It knows that remand numbers remain stubbornly high and that major prison replacement projects are slipping behind schedule.

We welcome the consultation and we are grateful that the Government is providing listening ears to concerns. However, we want to press the Government on the timing of this debate. Instead of planning ahead for decades, these are, once again, emergency measures.

The issue is simple: dangerous offenders should be in prison, victims deserve protection and communities deserve safety. Prison is a punishment, but it should also serve to rehabilitate. We have the tools that are needed to exist in a just society. We have a record high prison population, but we need only look at some of our Scandinavian neighbours for an example of how things can be done differently. However, instead of providing the investment that is needed, we are left patching with Band-Aids while the wraparound care that is needed to make sure that people have support when they are back home is thin, which increases the risk of reoffending.

I call on the Scottish Government to invest, plan strategically and more strategically face the facts—in all areas, but especially concerning our prisons. We need the court backlog to be cleared, we need to fix the root cause of offending and we need remand to be reduced where it is safe and appropriate to do so. We need credible and properly enforced community sentences, we need investment in rehabilitation that cuts reoffending and we need to plan ahead rather than barely cope as we move from one crisis to the next.

My critique today comes not from a place of values but from a place of delivery. I say to my fellow new members across the Parliament: please do not let the next five years be about us sharing values and disagreeing on delivery. We should hold our parties to account and take the actions that Scotland needs.

I move amendment S7M-00469.4, to insert at end:

“; further notes the persistently high remand population and the contribution that court delays and wider pressures within the justice system have on overcrowding in the prison estate; believes that public protection, rehabilitation, alternatives to custody and a reduction in reoffending must be pursued together rather than in competition with one another; further believes that investment in addiction treatment, mental health services, supported housing and effective community justice are essential to reducing offending and easing the pressure on prisons, and calls on the Scottish Government to publish a long-term strategy for achieving a sustainable prison population that commands public confidence and adequately supports victims and their rights to information, protection and safety.”