Hansard

The Scottish Rape Crisis Network welcomes the opportunity to come along to the Justice and Home Affairs Committee to raise our concerns about how the criminal justice system relates to women who complain about rape or sexual assault. I shall briefly outline the concerns of those who work in rape crisis centres and of the women who contact us, and identify some areas in which we feel action is needed to restore the confidence of women and girls in the criminal justice system. The evidence that I shall give you will be similar to the evidence that we gave to the Equal Opportunities Committee some months ago. Our concerns have not changed since then.

Let me begin by putting the issue in context. The significant majority of rapes and sexual assaults are not reported to the police. Around 80 per cent of women contacting rape crisis centres in Scotland do not report the incident to the police. For incidents that are reported, there is a very low conviction rate, estimated at between 9 and 15 per cent. Women who report incidents of sexual violence to the police frequently describe their experience of going through the criminal justice system as a process of violation.

Our experience is that attitudes in society towards women in general, and towards women who have been raped in particular, are reflected throughout the criminal justice system. The myth of women frequently making false or malicious allegations of rape or sexual assault is pervasive and identifiable throughout the criminal justice system. In reality, only between 2 and 4 per cent of complaints of rape are found to be false.

We are concerned by the lack of consistency in the police response to complaints of rape and sexual assault. There have been significant improvements in the police response in the past 15 years, such as the setting up of woman and child units and other specialist units throughout Scotland to deal with those crimes. However, some police officers still approach a woman complaining of rape and sexual assault with a view to proving or disapproving that she is lying. For example, women who make a complaint and have considerable physical injuries are still asked whether they have just had a bit of rough sex with their boyfriend and are regretting it. We consider it unacceptable that women who have just been raped should be subjected to that kind of questioning.

We are also concerned about the lack of availability of female police casualty surgeons, which is a point that women consistently identify as something that is difficult for them. In Strathclyde, only two female police casualty surgeons are available to examine women after a rape or sexual assault. Our final concern about the police response is about women who make a complaint about being raped by a policeman. The fact that the employing police force investigates any such complaint is a matter for concern.

We are concerned about the common-law definition of rape, which does not reflect the reality of women's experience. The common-law definition of rape is carnal knowledge of a female by a male obtained by overcoming her will. That is restricted to penetration of a woman's vagina by a man's penis, and excludes anal rape, oral rape and penetration by objects. If a woman is raped while sleeping, she is deemed unable to withhold her consent and the accused can therefore be charged not with rape, but only with clandestine injury.

We are also concerned about the lack of information given to women throughout the criminal justice process. There is no consistency throughout Scotland with regard to how women are kept informed of proceedings. Women are not necessarily informed if the accused is released on bail or if the case is marked "no proceedings", which can leave women feeling powerless. There can be considerable delays in cases getting to court, which can cause considerable distress and disruption. One of the women with whom I am working has now been given her 12th court date in six months. It is inappropriate that a woman should be subjected to such delay, disruption and trauma.

It can be a traumatic experience or prospect for women to go to court, face the defendant again and have to give evidence. Some women have to undergo aggressive cross-examination in court. That is the part of the criminal justice system that women describe as being similar to being raped a second time. There has been a lot of publicity recently about cross-examination of the complainer by the defendant. The Scottish Rape Crisis Network regards it as a violation of a woman's human rights to have to go through that experience. We welcome the Scottish Executive's commitment to stop women having to go through that ordeal, but we do not feel that it is helpful to consider the issue in isolation from what women go through generally at the hands of defence advocates in courts. In rape and sexual assault trials, aggressive cross-examination by the defence is commonplace; it is regarded as legitimate and justifiable by many within the criminal justice system.

We have particular concerns about the introduction of sexual history and sexual character evidence by the defence during rape and sexual assault trials in an attempt to discredit the complainer and to confuse juries. Legislation was implemented in 1986 under the Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1985, with the aim of limiting the introduction of such evidence. However, research carried out in 1992 found that evidence of that kind is introduced in around half trials by jury. In a significant minority of cases, the evidence is introduced without reference to the legislation, which means that the legislation is being broken.

The danger in rape trials is that neither the Crown nor the judge sees it as their role to intervene or object when the defence introduces such evidence. The researcher's view was that it should be generally known that the defence routinely tries to besmirch complainers, to call them liars, to bring in irrelevant evidence, to seize on any aspect of their sexuality and to construct motives for false allegations.

The research, which was carried out eight years ago, and anecdotal evidence from rape crisis centres give a clear picture of the shortcomings of the 1985 legislation and its implementation. The research also gave some clear recommendations on how the situation could be improved. However, our understanding is that the recommendations have gone nowhere. There is a clear and urgent need for a review of how the criminal justice system responds to complainers of rape and sexual assault.

We would like a number of issues to be considered, including the implementation of the existing recommendations on police response in the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities' response to violence against women, an examination of the common-law definition of rape and the establishment of structured provision of information to women throughout the criminal justice system. We feel that there is a strong need for tighter implementation of existing legislation on the introduction of evidence on sexual character and sexual history and we want the ending of the cross-examination of complainers by the defendant. We also want mandatory training of all criminal justice personnel to raise awareness of the effects of sexual violence on women.

We believe that consideration should also be given to the introduction of special prosecutors to prosecute crimes of sexual violence. We want adequate funding of rape crisis centres to enable us effectively to support women going through the criminal justice system. Finally, review and monitoring structures must be built into any changes of strategy to ensure that the changes are working and that women are able to receive protection and justice in our criminal justice system.