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As I said, stage 2 of that bill has just finished and the cabinet secretary has committed to looking at victim impact statements. I will ask Jim Wilson to comment on how that could impact section 3 of this bill.

I am happy to look into that. I will not commit to amending it, but it can be considered.

I will bring in Jim Wilson, but I do not have any strong views on the financial memorandum. I know from the evidence session that it was very hard to determine exact figures at that stage.

Just for clarity, the 2020 act made a number of amendments to animal welfare, animal health and wildlife legislation, and animal welfare is under Jim Fairlie’s portfolio, not the justice portfolio.

Under the legislation, Scottish ministers are obliged to review whether the 2020 act’s provisions are sufficient to ensure appropriate standards of animal welfare, animal health and the protection of wildlife. In August last year, when Mr Fairlie put out the review, the need for specific provisions on pet theft was considered. The Scottish Government sought views from the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, Police Scotland, the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, the Dogs Trust and the Scottish Sentencing Council on the current approach to pet theft, such as the laws used, the effectiveness of those laws and any proposal to introduce a new statutory offence of pet theft.

After considering the matter last year, the Scottish Government review concluded that we would not seek to legislate on pet theft. There appeared to be no consensus on whether such a move was necessary, but the Scottish Government was also aware that Mr Golden’s bill was being introduced.

As I said, we are taking a neutral stance at this stage, so nothing could prevent us from perhaps supporting it. However, as the Scottish Government, we want to look at the letter from the committee and the many points that were raised in it. We have not really had a chance to go into detail on that, because we received it only yesterday. We also want to look at the stage 1 report. I am happy to engage with the member further on the issue at that stage.

Yes.

Yes, it is.

It is amendment 172, which enacts our decision to merge the victim notification scheme and the victim information scheme. As we move forward with this, all victims will be contacted by the victim contact team. This is the underpinning legislation. You will see, when we move to the other amendments, that there will also be a legal gateway for the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service to provide data to the victim contact team so that victims can be contacted.

In short, this is the underpinning legislation to allow for data to be given to the victim contact team so that victims can be contacted.

There is a lot to respond to there. First, I will respond on Katy Clark’s amendment 61. I appreciate that it is unusual for this issue to be introduced at stage 2, with the minister and cabinet secretary leading on different parts of the bill, but I think that everybody appreciates that we really wanted to expedite VNS reform and the bill was the only vehicle through which to do that. I appreciate that, when Ms Clark initially lodged the amendment, it was unclear where we were going to end up today, but the amendment would not sit well in the bill. Having said that, I support the intention behind the amendment and am willing to work with Ms Clark before stage 3, so that we have support in place for victims.

A lot of issues have been raised by Mr Greene and Ms Clark. The victim contact team will be providing support to all victims. I have a spiel about it to read out, but I think that I did that at an earlier meeting, so I will not go through it now. I am happy to sit down with any member who wants to know exactly what the victim contact team hopes to achieve and discuss how we will take it forward from there. Ultimately, we do not want victims finding out that people have been released from prison by bumping into them at the supermarket. We are expediting reform of the victim notification scheme so that we have the victim contact team up and running. All victims will be contacted and can make an informed choice about what information they want.

Moving on to Mr Greene’s amendments, I can see the benefits of amendment 237, as I said, and I am happy to speak to Mr Greene about it. The same applies to amendment 238, which is well intentioned. However, we would need to engage with the Parole Board.

On amendment 243, it is not clear how the provision would operate within the current opt-in model. The amendment relies on the victim electing to receive notifications. However, it is not obvious how the amendment would work, as it suggests that the victim would have turned down an opportunity to receive information when they simply did not request it. A victim can elect to join the VNS at any point, and not just at the first point of contact. Amendment 243 may inadvertently suggest that that is not the case and that it is limited to a second chance-like timescale. That also applies to the changes that have been sought to section 17, whereby a victim is afforded an opportunity to make representations before an offender is released. I am aware that the amendment is, arguably, not trauma informed, but I am happy to discuss it further with Mr Greene.

On amendment 245, I am sympathetic to the principle of giving victims the choice to make oral representations in a greater number of cases in which parole is being considered, and I know that Pauline McNeill has raised the issue as well. However, as I mentioned, given the issue of proportionality and the need to consider the resource implications, I do not know whether it would be right to agree to the amendment at stage 2. Obviously, we would have to look at the financial memorandum, and we would need to scope the cost of all of that. That is why I ask members not to support amendment 245 at this stage.

Amendment 172 agreed to.

Amendments 173 to 178 moved—[Siobhian Brown].

I want to address a number of amendments in this group, including my own amendments to reform the victim notification scheme, also known as the VNS, as well as those that the committee has just heard about. I will take some time to explain what our amendments will achieve.

As I have indicated to the committee in writing, we want to combine the two criminal justice VNS elements: the current scheme for victims of offenders who have been sentenced to 18 months or more, and the victim information scheme, which is more limited and is currently available to victims of offenders sentenced to fewer than 18 months’ imprisonment. We want to provide all victims with the same entitlements to information, no matter the offender’s sentence length, and to expand the rights of all victims to be able to make representations when the offender is released on licence. That is what amendment 172 does.

Amendment 173 provides a legal gateway for the COPFS to directly provide victims’ personal data to Scottish ministers for it to be lawfully processed; that will enable their details to be automatically referred to the victim contact team, who can then discuss with victims their options in relation to registering with the VNS. That is necessary to underpin the establishment of the victim contact team, which is a key feature of the reformed VNS.

On the VNS amendments that have been lodged in the context of offenders subject to mental health orders and directions, amendment 174 amends section 2(3)(b) of the Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014 to include mentally disordered offenders—those subject to a compulsion order with a restriction order, known as a CORO; a transfer for treatment direction; or a hospital direction—among Scottish ministers’ functions for the purposes of the standards of service that must be published.

Such a move will allow for the standards to be updated, following the VNS’s introduction for mentally disordered offenders in the Mental Health (Scotland) Act 2015. The amendment means that those standards of service must be met in relation to victims of mentally disordered offenders and when making and resolving complaints, which will help ensure consistency of service and oversight across the whole VNS.

Amendments 175 to 178 amend the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2003, which I will refer to as the 2003 act from now on. Amendment 175 amends section 16A of that act to enable registered victims to continue to receive information through the CORO VNS when an offender on a CORO has been transferred out of Scotland, been made subject to corresponding measures and subsequently been transferred back to Scotland. It resolves a known difficulty, arising from the fact that, on return to Scotland, the offender is not subject to an order made in court proceedings in respect of the offence. The amendment also amends section 18B of the 2003 act to allow Scottish ministers to amend section 16A of the 2003 act by order, to include other offenders, such as those who transfer from other jurisdictions into Scotland for the first time and to other mentally disordered offenders in the future.

Amendment 176 relates to victims of offenders subject to a CORO, a hospital direction or a transfer of treatment direction. It amends section 17D of the 2003 act so that, where a victim has been afforded the opportunity to make representations under section 17B of that act, they are told that a decision has been taken and what the actual decision is.

The amendment inserts new subsections (5) and (6) into section 17D of the 2003 act to allow for victims to be informed of appeals against a decision by the Mental Health Tribunal for Scotland to make no order under section 193 of the Mental Health (Care and Treatment) Scotland Act 2003. When such a decision cannot competently be appealed against and is therefore final, a decision to make no order effectively means that the CORO has not been varied or revoked by the tribunal.

Amendment 177 relates to victims of offenders subject to a CORO. It inserts new subsections (3A) and (3B) into section 18A of the 2003 act to create a power to vary what is a “relevant condition” to a victim for the purposes of the conditional discharge of a CORO patient. Currently, victims are required to specify names and places that they are interested in, and that information determines the conditions relevant to them.

However, some victims do not provide that information and therefore miss out on information that they might receive under the CORO VNS. In other cases, when there is more than one registered victim, victims might specify different people and places and therefore receive different information on conditions, which can be confusing. This amendment will allow for consultation with victims on what conditions they consider to be relevant to them and the process of delivering that information to them, in order to inform changes to those aspects of the CORO VNS.

Amendment 178 also relates to victims of offenders subject to a CORO, a hospital direction or a transfer for treatment direction. It seeks to amend section 18A of the 2003 act by amending subsection (2) and inserting new subsections (2A) and (2B), with the aim of ensuring that victims receive information about a suspension of detention—that is, the first occasion that an offender is granted unescorted suspension of detention, allowing the offender to leave hospital grounds unescorted—that is relevant to them.

I will now turn to the rest of the amendments—

Yes.