Seòmar agus comataidhean

Before I begin, I refer colleagues to my entry in the register of members’ interests. I worked for a rape crisis centre before I was elected.

Amendment 54 seeks to address the widely acknowledged and long-standing problem of how domestic abuse is treated in child contact proceedings. It comes out of conversations with Scottish Women’s Aid and others, as it has become clear that we need to tackle the issue.

Professor Marianne Hester of the University of Bristol has written about the three planet model. She describes the domestic violence planet, where domestic violence is the crime in question. The—usually—father’s behaviour is recognised by the police and other agencies as being abusive to the mother, so he could be prosecuted or have orders taken out against him. At the same time, support agencies provide protection and refuge for the mother and civil and criminal laws provide intervention and support mechanisms. On this planet, the focus is on violent male partners who need to be contained and controlled in some way to ensure that the women and children are safe.

Then we have the child protection planet. When children are living with a mother who is experiencing domestic violence, this other planet, where a different set of professionals live, becomes involved. Here, public law deals with child protection and the emphasis is on the welfare of the child and its carer. In order to protect the children, social workers are likely to insist that the mother removes herself and her children. Despite professionals identifying that the threat of violence comes from the man, the mother is seen as responsible for dealing with the consequences and the violent man effectively disappears from the picture.

On the third planet, the child contact planet, there is yet another population, because a different set of professionals reside here, governed by private, not public, law. That has tended to place less emphasis on child protection and more on the idea that children should have two parents. In this context, an abusive father may still be deemed to be a good enough father, who should at least have contact with, if not custody of or residence with, his child, post-separation. The mother, who tried to protect the child from its father’s violent behaviour by calling in the police and supporting his prosecution on the domestic violence planet, and by leaving him, as instructed, on the child protection planet, is now ordered to allow contact between her violent partner and her children, leaving her confused and potentially fearful, again, for the safety of her children.

The challenge is how we bring those three planets into alignment so that the safety of women and children becomes paramount. That requires a better understanding of the dynamics of domestic violence and a co-ordinated approach by all the agencies and services involved. It is also vital that the gap is closed between violent men on the one hand and fathers on the other, so that they can be dealt with at the same time.

This is a cross-jurisdictional problem. In the Scottish context, the issue has been discussed by the Law Society for Scotland, the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland and others. A recent report by the Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research identified key problems, including a lack of mechanisms for communicating information between different court proceedings, and the judiciary’s limited and siloed understanding and consideration of domestic abuse.

Various recommendations have been made, some of which have been implemented, but we know that the problems persist, often at huge cost to the wellbeing of women and children.

Scottish Women’s Aid has suggested that a significant and potentially highly effective reform would be to ensure that, when possible, the same sheriff hears both the domestic abuse and the child contact case. That would make it much more likely that the evidence of abuse and its effects would be properly considered in all their depth and breadth, and that the gulf between the planets that Marianne Hester described could be bridged.

Thanks. I know that Evelyn Tweed wants to ask about local plans, so you will be able to delve into that in a little bit more detail.

Hannah, do you have anything else to say?

Thank you. You have spoken about teachers and about other public services that do not have a BSL facility. Are there any other areas where you think that measurable goals or specific outcomes would be beneficial? As you say, the plan is in its early days. Are there things that we can get into the plan at this stage?

Given your focus this morning on access to justice and related issues, do other elements, priorities and issues in the second plan need to work as well in order to get the access to justice stuff right? Are there other things that you would say need more focus and more attention in order for the points that you have made about justice to be taken seriously and implemented effectively?

That was helpful, and it moves me on nicely to Rachel O’Neill. I will ask your views about the second plan in general, but first, can you talk about the need to train people and ensure that the education is there so that deaf people can have the full range of career options?

Thanks; that was helpful. Given the need for quite specific care and attention around access to justice issues, were you involved in the discussions on the development of the second plan? If so, when you made those points, what came back to you? How did we get from the broader scope of the first plan to the smaller, watered-down, less ambitious—that is how it was described this morning—second plan?

Thank you. I know that Avril Hepner wants to come back in.

That is really helpful—thank you. Following on from that, are there things in the plan that need to be prioritised and should happen first? I know that, broadly speaking, certain things will happen in the first year or the second year and so on. However, being strategic, and in the mapping or analysis of what is missing, are there things that need to be prioritised?

It is almost as if mainstreaming only works one way—it does not come back. I will leave it there. Thank you.

Good morning, and thank you for joining us.

Before I come to my questions, I declare an interest, as, six or seven years ago, I worked for a vision impairment charity that did quite a lot of work across the sensory impairment landscape, including with deaf charities.

I am interested in views on the second national BSL plan, and I will come to Avril Hepner first. We have heard mixed views on that plan. It recognises some of the key issues for BSL users, but there are concerns that it lacks focus and does not have clear, measurable goals or specific outcomes—you have touched on some of that already—and that timelines and accountability are not always clear. There is also criticism that it was watered down from earlier drafts. My question is an open one. What are your views on that second plan, and how have you been involved in its development?