Volume of legislation scrutinised by justice committee is 'unacceptable', claim MSPs

The amount of legislation Holyrood’s justice committee is called on to scrutinise is “unacceptable”, outgoing MSPs have claimed.

Current members of the Scottish Parliament committee have published a report on their work over the last parliamentary term that urges the next Scottish Government to ease up on the number of bills brought forward.  

MSPs have also raised concerns over “little progress” being made towards the replacement of Cornton Vale, Scotland’s national women’s prison.

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The committee has considered 13 Scottish Government bills and four members’ bills over the past five years, compared to 12 by its predecessor.

“As a consequence, we have only had time to undertake one full-scale inquiry, which took place early in the session,” said a report. “We consider this to be unacceptable.”

The committee has “had little opportunity to make progress” on a number of inquiry topics that they identified for further work at the start of the parliamentary session, such as access to civil justice and reducing ‘churn’ in the criminal justice system.

“Without a clear commitment to reduce the number of justice bills, it is difficult to see how future justice committees can achieve a healthier balance between scrutiny of legislation and inquiry work,” added the report.

It is not the first time the committee has railed against the levels of legislation coming through. Convener Christine Grahame labelled the process “like a sausage machine, whichever government it is” in a previous interview with Holyrood.

A review of Holyrood’s committee system earlier this year called for the justice committee to be split in to two given it has been “more consistently burdened with legislation” than any other committee since the parliament’s inception.

However, the approach “did not appear to resolve the issue” when previously tested under a Labour Liberal Democrat coalition, according to members of the justice committee, who said it is “unclear how the proposal would work in practice”.

MSPs on the committee declared their “clear preference” that future governments revisit the volume of bills rather than for a second committee to be created.

Meanwhile, the justice sub-committee on policing has “effectively filled a void where the Scottish Police Authority has failed to provide robust governance and scrutiny of Police Scotland’s decisions”, according to the legacy report.

Concerns were also raised in the wake of last month’s inspection report on Cornton Vale prison after chief inspector of prisons David Strang criticised “wholly unacceptable” arrangements that have seen some inmates wait over an hour to use the toilet.

Ministers announced the week before that more than half of the women currently housed at Cornton Vale will be moved to HMP Polmont – which holds young offenders – over the summer, ahead of a smaller national prison being built on the same site.

“Although much progress in meeting the Commission on Women Offenders’ recommendations has been made, particularly in relation to the provision of mentoring services and support for women offenders, the committee notes that little progress has been made towards the key recommendation that Cornton Vale should be replaced,” said the report.

“We remain concerned at the conditions for women offenders, in this prison particularly in the light of HM Chief Inspector of Prisons latest inspection report.”