Draft Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2016 (Consequential Provisions) Order 2017

Lesley Laird Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2017 General Committees

[Lesley Laird (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Main.

The Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 2016 introduced reforms that will help to modernise, improve and enhance the efficiency of the Scottish criminal justice system. It does so by aiming to promote best practice and places an emphasis on streamlining the system. The draft order is a necessary step to make provisions as a result of the 2016 Act and makes a few alterations that I would like to touch upon today.

The draft order will enable the Lord Advocate, when acting under section 57 of the 2016 Act, to specify bodies and deal with matters that would otherwise be outwith the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament, in terms of section 29(2)(b) or (c) of the Scotland Act 1998. It will also require constables, officials and officers to have regard to the code of practice when searching a person who is not in police custody. Modifications are being made as a result of the 2016 Act; in particular, article 24(3) expands the procedural requirements made in relation to the 2016 Act to reflect the application to constables in non-territorial police forces.

Essentially, the main aims of the draft order are to lay down provisions to facilitate the streamlining of the statute book, and I am sure we can all see the benefit of that. It is a necessary piece of legislation to ensure that the UK statute book is not duplicated or contradicted in any way. For that reason, the Labour party supports the order.

Question put and agreed to.