Seòmar agus comataidhean

Freight capacity is usually measured in the number of available paths, i.e. the number of freight trains it is possible for infrastructure to accommodate alongside passenger trains. I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-35073 on 4 March 2025. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

A. There have been no discussions between the Scottish Government and the Camphill organisation regarding long-term funding for their work.

The Scottish Government takes the safety of the public very seriously. Sex offender notification requirements apply to an individual, irrespective of what name they use. Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements record any aliases in their documentation. The current position in legislation is that sex offenders must inform the police of a name change within three days and failure to notify such a change can result in a prison sentence.

We are aware that the Crime and Policing Bill, recently introduced to the UK Parliament, contains legislative change in this area. We are exploring the possibility of extending the provisions in the Crime and Policing Bill to Scotland. Any such amendment would be the subject of the legislative consent process.

Meetings with the Law Society of Scotland

1. I have had the following meetings with the Law Society of Scotland since 29 March 2023:

The recruitment and deployment of police officers is a matter for the Chief Constable. In 2023, Police Scotland restructuring led to a new establishment figure of around 16,500 to 16,600 officers. The Scottish Government’s record investment of £1.55bn in 2024-25 has enabled Police Scotland to undertake the highest level of recruitment since its inception, bringing officer numbers up to 16,508 at 31 December 2024.

Police Scotland’s three-year Business Plan 2024-2027 aims to make maximum impact with a workforce that has the right skills and capacity to keep people safe. Through workforce modernisation, they will reduce back-office duplication and create capacity to deal with new and increasing threats by moving more officers to frontline roles.

The Chief Constable has been clear that the context of frontline strength goes beyond an overall officer headcount and that of a police workforce which includes police staff.

The Scottish Government supports the Police Scotland Fleet Strategy. Telematics is a key element of that Strategy which aims to provide a fit for purpose, safe, reliable, and cost-effective police fleet.

We do not hold an estimate on the number of cases that the Commissioner will deal with in their first year in post.

The Commissioner’s functions and powers are set out in the Victims, Witnesses and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill. The Commissioner will be independent from the Scottish Ministers, and will determine how to best exercise the functions of their role, in accordance to the Bill.

The Scottish Government is committed to expanding electronic monitoring use across a broader range of licences and court orders, including exploring the use of new technology, such as remote alcohol monitoring, which is provided for by the Management of Offenders (Scotland) Act 2019.

Regulations came into force on 31 January 2025 which enable the use of GPS monitoring devices for those released on Home Detention Curfew (HDC). As work continues to embed these changes, we will engage with justice partners to explore the potential uses of new technologies, including both GPS and remote substance monitoring technologies. The functionality of GPS tags may have a role in helping to address particular behaviour associated with problematic alcohol use, for example, by excluding someone from a town centre on a Saturday night.

These statistics remain a stark reminder of the unacceptable levels of domestic abuse that occur in Scotland, and the devastating impact on victims and survivors. It is vital that perpetrators are held to account, and that women and children have access to frontline services dealing with violence and domestic abuse.

The 23% increase is in relation to crimes recorded under the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018. These crimes relate to a course of conduct only and therefore do not include all crimes relating to domestic abuse. A range of factors could be attributed to this increase, including the increasing time since this legislation was introduced and therefore a longer period over which a course of conduct can be committed and recorded through this Act.

To support victims, we are providing more than £7.5m to Women’s Aid groups in 2024-25 through our Delivering Equally Safe Fund and £1.2m (£1.197m) over this year and next to Scotland’s Domestic Abuse and Forced Marriage Helpline which provides round the clock support - 0800 027 1234.

Our Equally Safe Strategy is focused on early intervention and prevention and through the Delivering Equally Safe Fund (DES), 119 projects are supported from more than 100 organisations.

We have also recently announced a £2.4m uplift to the Delivering Equally Safe Fund for 2025-26, to allow all fund recipients to continue the vital work they undertake to prevent violence and support survivors of VAWG.

Emergency early release regulations have been utilised twice within the last five years (May 2020 and June/July 2024).

On both occasions, the conditions of release were as they would have been at the individual’s original scheduled liberation date. Therefore, as those eligible for release were serving short-term sentences, they were not routinely supervised or monitored following their release.

Therefore, information with regards to their housing circumstances, use of voluntary throughcare, and employment status is not held by the Scottish Government.