Seòmar agus comataidhean

I am happy to leave it there.

That is helpful. Thank you for that. I know that we are tight for time, convener. Do I have time for one more question? I will then be happy to pass on to others.

My question is short but it might be difficult. In 2019-20, around 2,300 rapes were reported to police in Scotland, of which around 300 went to prosecution and 130 were successfully prosecuted. We all know that everyone wants to improve that ratio. What role can the police play in that? The taking of an initial statement is only one part of the process. More evidence must be gathered and robust cases must be given to the Crown to improve prosecution rates. What more could the police do to improve that ratio in the coming years?

I find it fascinating that, where the approach in question was trialled, the conviction rate for rape was twice the national average.

As my other question is about advice to juries, I will park it and let other members come in.

It is clear to us from speaking to people that, for many victims of such crimes, the current system is not necessarily fit for purpose. That is the premise of our discussion. I do not think that these are isolated cases. I have spoken to jury members who have been told different things by judges, and there is clearly an issue. For example, there is huge confusion about what the not proven verdict means and what happens as a result of it. That sparks the question about Moorov and different decision makers in different bits of a case, for example. There is clearly work to be done there, but we can take that up with the cabinet secretary and the Lord Advocate, so I will not press the matter any further now.

The specific scenario that I was thinking about is one in which a recording of the accuser being fully cross-examined by the defence lawyer is played back during the live trial, and the jury—whether it is in the building or not—watches that evidence. Does that happen at the moment?

Good morning. Before I move on to my pre-planned questions, I want to pick up on some aspects of the discussion that we have had. What has struck me, over the past few months, is that part of the problem is the number of justice partners. I can see why a victim of crime or someone going through a criminal procedure might really struggle to work out who is responsible for what, who to complain to if there is an issue and, if those complaints are interlinked, which body has overall responsibility for dealing with them. It strikes me that there is no such body, and that is part of the problem.

If someone has a complaint against a sheriff, a JP or a judge, there is a specific Government process to go through. If the complaint is against a deputy, it goes to the Crown Office, and, if it is against a defence solicitor or a QC, they have their own regulatory environment through the Law Society of Scotland or the Scottish Legal Complaints Commission. If the complaint is about the work that you do, I presume that it comes to you in the first instance, and you are governed by the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman. The process is hard enough for me to get my head around, never mind someone who has been the victim of a traumatic crime. Therefore, can you see why so many people feed back to the committee and Parliament that they find the process extremely confusing, complex and retraumatising?

I might come back in later with some supplementary questions on other issues, but I have one more question at the moment.

Obviously, the elephant in the room is the backlog of cases that we are dealing with. From evidence that we have taken from victims of crime, we know about the inevitable stress and trauma that that creates. It is not simply a question of the timescale; it is about the fact that many of those cases have been cancelled or rescheduled many times—sometimes dozens of times. A number of victims, particularly survivors of crimes of sexual assault and abuse and gender-based violence, have called for statutory maximum timescales for trials of that nature.

We are very aware of the backlog, and I appreciate that you are only one cog in the machine, but what can you do in that regard? Given that we are coming up to negotiations around the budget, what would you ask the Government to do to facilitate more trials more quickly, while, at the same time, not weakening the sanctity and effectiveness of those trials? Both parties have an absolute right to a fair trial. In an ideal world, what would happen in order for you to process those cases more quickly?

Are findings and learning from pilots and trials arising from initiatives such as the UK rape review, which is the underlying principle of some of the reforms to the way in which sexual assault cases are tried in England and Wales, shared between SCTS and Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service or the Ministry of Justice? What conversations take place in that regard?

You will be relieved to learn that I am not going to ask you to comment on the Moorov principle. Those matters are for other judicial partners, as you have said. However, it is clear that there are two sticky areas in the Scottish system—first, the use of three verdicts and the issue of corroboration, and secondly the complexity of navigating things such as the Moorov principle. Our initial questions were about whether jurors really understand the intricacies of all of that and the consequences of any decisions that they might make, which is an issue that arose as a result of evidence with regard to a case where that aspect was not clear to the jury.

With regard to the comments about responsibilities, I presume that the judge or sheriff has a duty to counsel and advise jurors from the day that the jury is picked. Danielle McLaughlin mentioned the Judicial Office, by which I presume she means the one at St Andrew’s house—in other words, in the Scottish Government. The ultimate responsibility therefore lies with the cabinet secretary for justice, not the Lord Advocate or the Crown. Who would have overarching responsibility for making any reforms?