Community justice strategy: delivery plan

Aim 2 - Ensure that robust and high quality community interventions and public protection arrangements are consistently available across Scotland

Priority Action 3:

Support the use of robust alternatives to remand by ensuring high quality bail services are consistently available and delivered effectively

Deliverables

8. Ensure bail supervision services are available in all local authorities and that electronic monitoring of bail is introduced across Scotland.

Timescale: December 2023

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Local Authorities
• In collaboration with - Social Work Scotland, third sector and Scottish Government

Further Detail:

National Guidance and additional funding has been provided to support this deliverable, which will improve the options for alternatives to remand available to the judiciary across Scotland.

Bail supervision services being in place in all local authorities is dependent on factors including recruitment of staff. December 2023 is an intended timescale but progress will be reviewed at that date.

9. Increase levels of suitability assessments for bail supervision and electronically monitored (EM) bail.

Timescale: December 2023

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Local Authorities
• In collaboration with - Social Work Scotland and Scottish Government

Further Detail:

The suitability assessment process is undertaken by local authority justice social work services, who will provide statistical returns to evidence levels of suitability assessments undertaken. The process is supported by National Guidance for Bail Supervision and National Guidance for EM bail, and following collaboration by Scottish Government, Social Work Scotland, RMA, justice social work and Community Justice Scotland an amalgamated suitability assessment template has been introduced.

10. Identify further areas for action, in line with proposals in the Bail and Release from Custody (Scotland) Bill, to strengthen alternatives to remand across Scotland and build adequate capacity and resilience locally.

Timescale: April 2024

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - justice partners including Community Justice Scotland, victims organisations, third sector, and Local Authority representatives through the Alternatives to Remand Reference Group

Further Detail:

The short life Alternatives to Remand Reference Group was established to provide expertise and operational insight to inform the proposed areas for action in relation to the future development of alternatives to remand.

The Scottish Government will continue to work with key stakeholders to drive forward areas of action to strengthen the availability, effectiveness and confidence in alternatives to remand in Scotland.

This will include consideration of justice social work and other community justice services capacity and other associated pressures currently being faced, including ongoing recovery from the COVID pandemic.

Priority Action 4:

Strengthen options for safe and supported management in the community by increasing the use of electronic monitoring technologies

Deliverables

11. Engage with justice partners to explore the viability of new technologies and policy uses, including location monitoring.

Timescale: April 2024

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - Local Authorities, Police Scotland, Community Justice Scotland, SCTS, SPS, SWS and the electronic monitoring service provider

Further Detail:

New technologies or uses have the potential to provide alternative monitoring capabilities and increase the range of community alternatives available to courts and SPS across Scotland.

12. Work with key stakeholders to explore options to optimise the operating model for Home Detention Curfew (HDC) for short-term prisoners. We will seek to achieve this by examining and reviewing current practice, the risk assessment process, the application process, as well as key decision points and the statutory operating protocol.

Timescale: June 2024

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - SPS, RMA and relevant justice partners

Further Detail:

The Bail & Release from Custody (Scotland) Bill proposes to remove long-term prisoners from the HDC process and introduces a new temporary release licence for that cohort which focuses both on providing more opportunities for structured testing and the provision of further evidence to the Parole Board to inform their decision on whether to recommend release on parole. Release on this licence will be underpinned by risk assessment and consultation with the Parole Board and is intended to support successful reintegration.

HDC remains an important and recognised part of the re-integration process, allowing eligible individuals a supported return to the community in the lead up to their release. Ensuring it operates optimally and functions as intended is critical to its use.

Therefore, Short-term prisoners will continue to access HDC and the planned review will explore if any changes to the existing HDC process could better support the re-integration opportunities for this cohort.

Priority Action 5:

Ensure that those given community sentences are supervised and supported appropriately to protect the public, promote desistence from offending and enable rehabilitation by delivering high quality, consistently available, trauma-informed services and programmes

Deliverables

13. Revise and publish updated guidance on justice social work reports and court-based justice social work services.

Timescale: September 2023

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - relevant statutory community justice partners, third sector, RMA, Community Justice Scotland and Social Work Scotland

Further Detail:

Updated Justice Social Work Report and court-based services guidance will help ensure consistency of practice across the country.

Other relevant Justice Social Work guidance will be kept under review, and updates made where appropriate.

14. Publish a research report on the use of Drug Testing and Treatment Orders (DTTOs) and Community Payback Orders (CPOs) for people with substance use problems, as part of the Cross-Government Action Plan in response to the Drug Deaths Taskforce's report and recommendations.

Timescale: August 2023

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government

Further Detail:

Action 98 of the DDTF report recommended that the Scottish Government should review Drug Treatment and Testing Orders, Community Payback Orders and other community sentencing options to assess how they have been used, their outcomes and whether they are the most effective mechanism to support a person's recovery and reduce recidivism rates.

Once the review has been completed, the Scottish Government will consider what further action may be required, taking into account the Vision for Justice in Scotland, the National Strategy for Community Justice, and engagement with partners around implications for policy and practice.

15. Complete an evidence review of the current Justice Social Work landscape.

Timescale: March 2024

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - third sector, Care Inspectorate, RMA, COSLA, Community Justice Scotland, Scottish Association of Social Workers, and Social Work Scotland

Further Detail:

This will help inform a decision on whether justice social work will be included in the National Care Service or not. It will also review what is working well and what improvements could be made to justice social work arrangements with consideration given on how this will strengthen community justice as a whole.

Alongside other relevant deliverables, the identified actions which emerge from this research will form part of a coordinated programme of work aimed at supporting the development of justice social work services the short, medium and longer term.

16. Complete a review of the principles which underpin the Justice Social Work funding formula which is used to distribute over £100m of community justice funding annually across 32 local authorities. This will help inform the future development of the formula and distribution methodology, including identifying areas for improvement. This work over the next 12 to 18 months will be led by the Community Justice Funding Review Group (FRG).

Timescale: December 2024

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - Community Justice Scotland, Social Work Scotland, COSLA, and third sector

Further Detail:

This deliverable will contribute to ongoing efforts to ensure that consistent, high quality community justice services are available across Scotland, with a continued emphasis on encouraging a shift from custody to community interventions.

This work will include consideration of any particular issues currently impacting on the distribution of justice social work funding and any opportunities which may arise in advance of a more significant review of the funding formula (for example, in relation to the impact of the pandemic and ongoing recovery efforts on workloads).

17. Work with key stakeholders to develop a programme of work to support development of Trauma Responsive Social Work Services. This includes a programme of implementation support and training for social work services, including justice social work.

Timescale: April 2024

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - the Trauma Responsive Social Work Services Partnership Delivery Group and Expert Advisory Group

Further Detail:

The Office of the Chief Social Work Adviser (OCSWA) has appointed a Programme Lead to work with key stakeholders to ensure Scotland's social work services are able to recognise where people are affected by trauma, and to respond in ways which reduce risks of retraumatising and supports recovery.

OCSWA are working closely with the Scottish Government's Trauma, ACES and Resilience Unit, NHS Education for Scotland (NES) and the Improvement Service to ensure this work aligns with the National Trauma Training Programme.

18. Pilot and initiate evaluation of the Moving Forward 2 Change (MF2C) programme for sexual offending.

Timescale: August 2023

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Scottish Government
• In collaboration with - Local authorities, SPS and Community Justice Scotland

Further Detail:

This will involve piloting the re-developed Moving Forward Making Changes programme, known as MF2C, and taking steps towards accreditation.

19. Pilot an assessment method for individuals who commit offences relating to indecent images of children (IIOC).

Timescale: June 2024

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - RMA
• In collaboration with - Scottish Government and Local authorities

Further Detail:

This will involve work on the IIOC Framework.

Priority Action 6:

Ensure restorative justice is available across Scotland to all those who wish to access it by promoting and supporting the appropriate and safe provision of available services

Deliverables

20. Increase knowledge and awareness of restorative justice and ability to direct people to appropriate restorative justice services as and when these become available.

Timescale: April 2025

Responsibility:

• Lead partner - Community Justice Scotland
• In collaboration with - Children and Young People's Centre for Justice (CYCJ), Scottish Government and community justice statutory partners including Local Authorities and Police Scotland

Further Detail:

The model for delivery of restorative justice in Scotland requires an effective link with community justice partners, facilitated by local partnerships and local communities to support implementation.

This deliverable aims to support the implementation of the wider commitment to have restorative justice services available across Scotland to all those who wish to access it, at a time that is appropriate to the people and case involved.