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The Drummond Hunter Memorial Lecture;
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The Howard League for Penal Reform in Scotland Consultation and Comment The Howard League often responds to consultation with its views on proposed changes or reforms in the Criminal Justice system and has put forward written and oral evidence to the Justice Committee of the Scottish Parliament.
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In recent months it has considered the 'Putting Communities First' proposals published by the Scottish Executive on dealing with anti-social behaviour. The League felt that a number of the proposals were misguided and has sent in its response to the Minister for Communities, Margaret Curran MSP. Click on this link to download the response as a word document. <HLS response.> Since then the Parliament has started its examination of the Executive's Bill on antisocial behaviour and the Communities Committee has taken oral evidence from among others Dr Sula Wolff who was largely responsible for the League's response. You can see her evidence at col 244 et seq in the Official report for 3rd December 2003
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Anti Social Behaviour |
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| The League also wrote to the Justice Minister, Cathy Jamieson MSP,to express its concern over the proposals from the Executive arising out of the Bonomy report and, in particular the proposal to increase Sheriffs' sentencing powers. The League's concern is that increasing these powers will result in an increase in the Scottish prison population. You can see the League's letter and the Ministers response by clicking on these links: <HLS letter on Bonomy and the Minister's reply>. We did not feel the Minister's response dealt adequately with our letter and wrote to her again. Her response can be read here.(Warning:depending on the speed of your connection these graphics files can take over a minute to download and appear) |
Procedural Reform in the Courts |
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| We were also invited to offer views to the independent inquiry sponsored by the Esmee Fairbairn foundation and set up under the chairmanship of Lord Coulsfield to consider Alternatives to Custody. The inquiry issued a questionnaire seeking responses by the end of September 2003 (subsequently extended until 17th October). You can see our response here Submission to Lord Coulsfield. The Committee subsequently took evidence in Edinburgh on the 18th November. |
Alternatives to Custody |
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| The Scottish Executive have announced that they are to remove imprisonment for fine default in many cases by making supervised attendance orders mandatory in the event of default (see Executive news release). The league welcomes any steps which reduce the use of imprisonment but has pointed out that this particular measure can only have a very limited impact on prison numbers as fine defaulters spend such short periods in prison. (See the letter to the Scotsman on this point.) | Fine Default | |
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On 2nd March 2004 the Scottish Executive sent out a consultation pack on measures, including re-structuring of services within the crminal justice system, to reduce re-offending in Scotland. Views were invited by 25 May. The League has put forward its views (see link opposite) to the Executive taking account of the views expressed by members and the discussion paper produced by the Scottish Consortium on Crime and Criminal Justice.
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Reducing reoffending in Scotland " Reduce" " Rehabilitate" " Reform" |
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