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Section One: Introduction
Introduction and purpose of the consultation
1. The Scottish Government has recently completed a consultation exercise to invite views on the use of intermediaries as a special measure for vulnerable witnesses in Scotland.
2. The policy background is that the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999 introduced intermediaries as a special measure in England and Wales. This was established on a pilot basis initially and rolled out across England and Wales in the course of 2007/8. The Vulnerable Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2004 allowed for certain special measures to help provide support for 'vulnerable witnesses' when giving evidence in court but did not specifically provide for the use of an 'intermediary' as a special measure for giving evidence. However, a commitment was given to the Justice Committee by the then Minister for Justice to consider the introduction of intermediaries as a special measure following the evaluation report of the pilot study on intermediaries conducted by England and Wales which resulted in this current consultation process here in Scotland.
3. The consultation document set out the Scottish context for the provisions of the Vulnerable Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2004. It described the current policies and practices in the Scottish justice system in addressing the communication needs of vulnerable witnesses, and posed various options for the future and their possible implications, advantages and disadvantages. The paper concluded by setting out a number of questions on which views were welcomed.
4. For the purposes of the consultation exercise the definition used for an intermediary was:
"In general, an intermediary is a third party who may act as a go-between to facilitate communication between a vulnerable witness and the court".
5. The purpose of this report is to present the findings of the analysis of responses to the consultation exercise.
6. Because the subject matter of the consultation was so specialised it was decided to distribute the consultation document to respondees of the earlier consultation on support for vulnerable witnesses, the "Vital Voices - 2002", which included a question on the use of intermediaries. That paper had been sent to individuals, members of the judiciary and third sector organisations. In addition we sent copies to members of the Vulnerable Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2004 Implementation Steering Group and a Wider Reference Group. In total we distributed 61 copies. We also published it on the Scottish Government's website. The closing date for receipt of responses was 15 January 2008, extended to 4 February 2008. (A full list of consultees is contained in Appendix A. A list of respondents is contained in Appendix B).
7. A total of 35 responses were received. Of those 35 responses 3 specifically stated that they did not wish to respond, or that they had no time, leaving 32 responses for analysis. 7 respondents did not wish to have their responses published, or did not complete the permission form and therefore had to be deemed as not giving permission.
8. The table below contains information on the number of responses received, by category interest group. A full list of respondees (those who gave permission to have their responses published) is at Appendix B.
Responses to the Consultation by Interest Group category
Category | Number of responses received |
|---|
Speech and Language Therapy | 1 |
|---|
Individuals (profession not known) | 2 |
|---|
Academic | 2 |
|---|
Social Work/Local Authority | 3 |
|---|
Judges/Sheriffs | 3 |
|---|
Mental Health Organisations | 3 |
|---|
Professional Associations - legal | 5 |
|---|
Public/Statutory Bodies | 6 |
|---|
Voluntary organisations | 7 |
|---|
TOTAL | 32 |
|---|
9. It should be noted from the outset that not all respondents addressed each question. It should also be noted that the numbers from each interest group tended to be small and therefore the findings are specific to the consultation exercise and do not necessarily reflect the weight or range of views within the interest group as a whole.
10. The exceptions to this are the legal professional associations, the statutory/public bodies and the voluntary organisations. Many of these organisations on the distribution list responded. A total of 3 members of the judiciary offered their own personal views.
11. Justice for Children submitted a response which was endorsed by 8 other respondents, four of whom were from voluntary organisations. The others were an academic, a social worker and the Law Society - Family Law Sub-Committee. All these respondents submitted additional points and should be regarded as having added value.
Analytical method
12. All the responses were collated on an Excel spreadsheet, one row for each response. Each question was examined for detail and those details transferred to columns headed by key words, so that similarity in answer could be recognised with ease. Where responses were given at other questions throughout the questionnaire these were collated and cross-referenced. Since most of the answers were given in open format very little qualitative analysis could be done, and the numbers quoted are indicative of nothing more significant than that these are the numbers who responded in a particular way. They are not representative of their interest group.
13. Question 9 was posed in a multiple choice format. However, it became apparent that there was a differing level of understanding amongst respondents of the exact terms used in the questions, and the multiple choice format failed to extract significant differences in meaning which had emerged elsewhere in the responses.
Structure of the Report
14. The purpose of this report is to present the findings of the analysis of responses to the consultation exercise. The results of the analysis are contained in 6 sections, each covering who responded, in what numbers, the findings of each question and outlines the broad consensus of opinion, along with unresolved issues.
15. Section Two containsrespondents' views on the barriers to communication with child and adult vulnerable witnesses within the current Scottish Criminal Justice System and methods for removing them (Questions 1-3). Section Three explores respondents' views on the role and remit of Intermediaries if made statutory (Questions 4-8). The several possible statuses of intermediaries within the Scottish criminal justice system are quantified in Section Four (Question 9). Section Five explores the impact of using intermediaries on the court process in the Scottish Criminal Justice System (Questions 10- 13), and finally Section 6 examines additional issues (Question 14)
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