Visiting Committees provide vital, regular and independent monitoring

In the last Justice and the Law Officers question time of 2011, Margaret Mitchell MSP, pressed the case for the retention of Visiting Committees with the Cabinet Secretary for Justice, Kenny MacAskill MSP. This came after the announcement in early December that they were to be replaced by a new dedicated independent advocacy service for prisoners.

The MSP says that the letter which has been issued by the Visiting Committees members following their meeting with the Cabinet Secretary provides further evidence that the Scottish government should think again.

Margaret Mitchell MSP said:

"Prison visiting committees make frequent and, crucially, unannounced visits to prisons, and are able to access all parts of the prison and speak to both prisoners and staff. I have, like other MSPs, heard first-hand the vast wealth of objective experience which visiting committees have and greatly value the independent evidence they have shared with the parliament. Significantly this evidence has, often, been at variance with the official line from SPS.

"Visiting committees (which represent value for money) are not a duplication of services as currently their role differs from that of the HMIP and would complement the new proposed advocacy service. To that end, back in December I asked the cabinet secretary if it would be possible to retain the visiting committees which work well with HMIP. The new advocacy service has, or should have, a very distinct role in prisons in its own right.

"Quite simply, as emphasised by the Association of Visiting Committee Members in their letter, the proposed advocacy service, which would replace the visiting committees, would not provide the vital regular, independent monitoring of prisons which make the Visiting Committee's so distinctive. This in turn, would leave Scotland as the only part of the UK without a system of independent monitoring."

Attached is a copy of the Association of Visiting Committee's Letter.

The relevant part of the Official Report of the Justice and the Law Officers question time can be found here:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/28862.aspx?r=6647&mode=html#iob_60571

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