The Scottish Government

In March 2009, our Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Bill was introduced into Parliament. It is a wide ranging piece of legislation that includes measures to:

• Create a Scottish Sentencing Council to ensure greater transparency and consistency in the sentencing process
• Make sentences served in the community more robust, immediate and visible through creation of the Community Payback Order
• Take the fight to those involved in organised crime through the creation of new serious organised crime offences
• Crack down on prisoners who make use of advances in mobile phone technology to run their criminal empires from prison
• Raise the age at which a child can be prosecuted in adult criminal courts from eight to 12 to help ensure the rights and needs of children are balanced properly with the protection of communities
• Help the courts and prosecutors through a number of sensible reforms to the criminal law and court procedures - ensuring the interests of justice are served and protecting the rights of victims and witnesses
• Assist in the detection of crime through improvements to the law as regards when DNA and fingerprint data is able to be retained for use in detecting and prosecuting crime
• Provide a statutory framework for the disclosure of evidence to the defence in criminal cases - confirming the integrity as to how our courts deal with cases
• Ensure our licensing laws are robust - Note: Following the introduction of this Bill, it was decided the Scottish Government would bring forward a separate Bill to deal with a number of alcohol related measures including the proposals relating to the off sale of alcohol to those aged 21 or under and the introduction of a social responsibility levy. As a result, we intend to seek to remove section 129 (sale of alcohol to persons under 21 etc.) and section 140 (licensed premises: social responsibility levy) of this Bill at Stage 2.

"We need modern, effective laws that work in tackling criminals and their criminal behaviour. I want to ensure that the dedicated people working in our criminal justice system are equipped to deal with the impact of offending from the moment a crime is committed, through the police investigation and court process and then when the sentence is handed out to the offender.

"The Bill is not expected to finish its parliamentary passage until 2010. I look forward to taking the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Bill through Parliament and introducing changes to the law so that our criminal justice agencies - the police, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency, the Scottish Court Service, the Scottish Prison Service and other vital partners - can help ensure Scotland truly is a safer and stronger place for hard working families to live and work in."

Kenny MacAskill - Cabinet Secretary for Justice

September 2009