Protection of Vulnerable Groups and Disclosure of Criminal Information: consultation report

Consultation Report

Acknowledgements

The Scottish Government would like to thank all individuals and organisations who took the time to consider and respond to the proposals contained in the consultation on the Protection of Vulnerable Groups and the Disclosure of Criminal Information regime in Scotland.

Introduction

The consultation paper was published on 25 April 2018, with five sections in the paper that sought stakeholders’ views and asked 94 questions. Although the consultation ran for 12 weeks ending on the 18 July 2018, late responses were accepted.

The consultation was distributed widely to a large number of key stakeholders, including over 3,000 registered bodies. We received 352 responses, 268 from organisations and 84 from individuals. Responses were received from a range of stakeholders with varying backgrounds including the judiciary, the legal sector, local government, voluntary organisations and the medical profession.

The online consultation was designed to allow respondents to respond to only the areas that are relevant to them. Not all respondents completed the consultation questionnaire. Some respondents preferred to provide a written statement. The nature of the submissions varied with some providing responses to one question and others providing more detailed discussion on sections of the proposals that were of interest to them.

Involvement in the Development of our Proposals

Our consultation paper, the responses to it and this report are only the start of the process of involving those with an interest in our proposals and their continued development. We will want to make sure that there will be opportunities to engage further with users and practitioners as we prepare the draft legislation. The Scottish Parliament’s consideration of the Disclosure Bill (which was announced in the Programme for Government published on 4 September 2018) will be accompanied by thorough scrutiny including drawing on the expertise of those already involved in the system.

Discussions with Stakeholders

There was extensive engagement with stakeholders during the consultation period. This included group discussions and meetings with individual groups or organisations. These sessions took place on:

A summary of the main points from the events can be found at Annex A. Annex B provides you a list of those who were invited to the sessions and those who attended.

Responses

This report provides an analysis of all the responses to the Scottish Government consultation on proposals for change to the Protection of Vulnerable Groups and Disclosure Regime in Scotland. Individual responses are not repeated verbatim in the report. The responses received will inform the development of our legislative proposals.

The table below provides a breakdown of all 352 respondents. It is clear from the consultation responses that respondents did not answer questions that were outwith their sphere of interest.

Those who responded broadly came from:

• Public Sector (38)
• Third Sector (172)
• Private Business (19)
• Education (17)
• Health (22)
• Individuals (84)

Where respondents gave permission, their responses have been published on the Citizen Space website at: https://consult.gov.scot/disclosure-scotland/protection-of-vulnerable/consultation/published_select_respondent.

The 245 respondents who agreed to their response being published are listed in Annex C.

The report is in two parts: part one sets out the questions posed in the consultation questionnaire and provides a summary of comments from respondents and part two is a discussion of the key issues raised which were not specific to the questions asked. The completion of the consultation questionnaire was uneven and therefore the number of responses for each question varies.