Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018: interim reporting requirement

1. Introduction

This report sets out the information that has been gathered by the Scottish Government to meet the statutory Reporting Requirement of the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018 as set out Section 14 of the Act.

The Reporting Requirement requires the publication of both statistical information relating to the progress and outcomes of domestic abuse cases in court and information about the experiences of witnesses in domestic abuse cases, including child witnesses, as well as information about court business. The Reporting Requirement period covers the first three years of operation of the Act which is the period 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2022. The information that is required is as follows:

• The number of cases for the new domestic abuse offence and statutory aggravation where criminal proceedings are undertaken
• Where the offence is prosecuted:
  • how many occasions is the offence libelled as being aggravated by reason of involving a child in the committal of the offence
  • how many occasions is the offence provided as being aggravated in this way
• The number of cases for the offence where a conviction results
• The number of cases where a non-harassment protective order is imposed in favour of:
  • The direct victim of the offence
  • Children affected by the committal of the offence
• Average length of time in cases from the start of criminal proceedings to a finding or verdict as to guilt
• Information about the experience of witnesses at court including children
• Information from the Lord President on how court business is arranged, including in different areas or types of court, so as to ensure the efficient disposal of cases involving those sorts of offences.

The full Reporting Requirement is set out in Annex 2.

The Reporting Requirement covers a period of three years from when the Act came into force (1 April 2019). The Reporting Requirement is being met in two parts:

• An 'Interim Report' (this report) which covers the statistical data (s14: 1,2,3) in part; information about experiences of witnesses at court (s14: 2(f)) in full, and information on court business (s14: 4) in full.
• A 'Final Report'' which will cover the remaining statistical data. This will be laid in Parliament in 2023 once the statistical data for the year 2021-22 is available for analysis.

A detailed schedule of which data will be published in which report is provided in Annex 3.

It is important to note that whilst the information in this report provides a vital contribution to the broader evidence base on the Act, it is does not represent a full evaluation of the impact of the legislation. Neither of the years which the statistical data covers (2019-20 and 2020-21) are likely to be fully representative of its future use^[1]. The context within which the data and evidence was gathered was one of early implementation of the Act. Furthermore, two of the three years of the reporting period coincided with the COVID-19 pandemic. This significantly impacted on the workings of the justice system, associated services and the lived experience of victims/witnesses of domestic abuse. These factors are important context for understanding the circumstances in which the Act was implemented and the evidence presented in this report.

A full description of the legislation and the reporting requirement, and the context and background is provided in the next section. This includes a summary of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the justice system and experiences of victims of domestic abuse. The reader is also directed to Chapter 10 which provides a more detailed explanation of the scope and limitations of the evidence gathered for this report. Of particular note is the above context and a general observation that the small-scale and self-selecting nature of the samples (research participants) involved in the victim/witness research mean that it is not possible to know whether the findings are representative of the experiences of victims and witnesses in domestic abuse cases as a whole.

Whilst not explicitly required by the Reporting Requirement, evidence about victim and witness experiences of the justice system as a whole (i.e. from the point at which a report is first made to the police) that arose from the research is included (see Chapter 7) as it provides useful context to understand the findings on victims' and witnesses' 'at court' experiences (Chapter 5). It also reflects the fact that some participants found the system confusing, and that distinguishing between different stages, organisations and legislation/charges was problematic. In a similar vein, emerging findings from the research in relation to the Act (Chapter 6) and suggestions for improvement (Chapter 8) are also included.