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INSPECTORATE OF PROSECUTION IN SCOTLAND
Thematic Report on Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal
Service's Response on Race Issues
INTRODUCTION
This is the first report of the Inspectorate of
Prosecution in Scotland. The creation of an independent
inspectorate was the first recommendation of Dr Raj Jandoo
in his report into the liaison arrangements between the
Police, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and
the family of the deceased Surjit Singh Chhokar which was
laid before the Scottish Parliament in October 2001. The
Chhokar case had raised serious questions about how the
Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service had handled the
prosecution.
The Lord Advocate accepted this recommendation and the
new Independent Inspectorate was launched in December 2003.
It is an indication of how seriously Crown Office took the
issues raised in the Chhokar case that the now Lord
Advocate, Colin Boyd, QC commissioned a report in May 2000
by the then Regional Fiscal at Aberdeen, now
Solicitor-General for Scotland Mrs Elish Angiolini, QC,
into liaison with the family of the deceased and then on
29 November 2000 announced 2 independent inquiries - the
inquiry by Dr Raj Jandoo into liaison arrangements in the
case and Sir Anthony Campbell's report into prosecutorial
decisions.
Prior to the creation of the independent Inspectorate
the Crown Office had employed a number of different
procedures to examine working practices across the Service.
The then Management Services Group produced a number of
office reviews, the focus of these reviews being to ensure
the efficient deployment of resources. These reports were
delivered to the Crown Agent.
There then followed a concern that the focus of such
reviews should shift towards examining the quality of
decision-making and consequently a Quality and Practice
Review Unit was set up in 1999 and the remit of this unit
included the inspection of the Crown Office and Procurator
Fiscal Service and to report to the Crown Agent on
- the quality of professional practice including
decision-making and processes;
- identifying and promoting good practice;
- making recommendations about improving practice;
and
- the development of performance indicators with
respect to quality.
This Unit conducted a number of office reviews and
produced a number of thematic reports. It was not the
practice to routinely publish these reports.
Dr Jandoo's first recommendation was
"An inspectorate of the Crown Office and Procurator
Fiscal Service should be established, headed by an
independent Inspector. The Crown Office Quality and
Practice Review Unit should be reinforced and reconstituted
as a support unit to the Inspectorate. The Inspectorate's
reports, like those of other Inspectorates, should be made
public."
Dr Jandoo went on to say that the Crown Office had for
too long been perceived as a faceless organisation,
arrogant, secretive and accountable to no one. The
Inspectorate would be a means to introduce a measure of
accountability which is essential for public
confidence.
The Lord Advocate accepted this (and Dr Jandoo's other
recommendations) and a project team was created to
establish the Inspectorate. A consultation document was
prepared and published and following analysis of the
feedback the Inspectorate was set up on 31 December 2003.
The first Chief Inspector was appointed in August 2004.
Dr Jandoo's second recommendation was that "the Crown
Office Inspectorate should conduct a thematic inspection of
the Service's response on race matters. The inspection
methodology should be thorough, it should not be limited to
a paper exercise and should include input from external
sources".
This thematic report is in implementation of that second
recommendation. Being a thematic report the intention is to
present a national picture about the Crown Office and
Procurator Fiscal Service's response on race issues. It is
particularly appropriate that this should be the first work
of the new Inspectorate given that its origin lay in the
Jandoo report into the tragic case of Surjit Singh Chhokar.
This review reflects the high profile which race and
equality issues have in the criminal justice system.
Although race crime is an important part of that profile
this report is not limited to race crime but includes
employment practices and the efforts made to develop
arrangements for community engagement. It therefore
attempts to take a holistic view of the whole operation of
the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service including
its strategic approach. Measuring the Department's
compliance with the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 is
a feature of the review.
To honour the commitment that the methodology should be
thorough and not limited to a paper exercise and include
input from external sources a remit, methodology and work
programme was devised and the advice of the Commission for
Racial Equality taken.
A series of issues were identified including
1. The adequacy of service delivery to minority ethnic
users, including
- an evaluation of the effectiveness and degree of
compliance with current prosecution policy in respect
of crimes with a racial dimension;
- an assessment of levels of compliance with the Lord
Advocate's Guidelines to Chief Constables in relation
to the investigation and reporting of racist crime, the
assessment of language needs and cultural sensitivities
and preparation of death reports and associated crime
reports;
- an assessment of present arrangements for the
provision of translation and interpreting services to
all victims, next of kin and witnesses;
- a review of the adequacy of the current
arrangements for the provision of information, support,
advice and assistance to all victims and witnesses from
a minority ethnic background.
2. An assessment of recruitment and employment issues
within the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service,
including
- a review of current recruitment initiatives to
raise the profile of the organisation within the
minority ethnic community and an evaluation of their
success in seeking to increase the proportion of staff
within the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service
from a minority ethnic background;
- an evaluation of training initiatives within the
organisation and their success in raising awareness
amongst staff of race and equality issues and in
modifying current practice;
- a study of current attitudes amongst staff towards
equality issues and of staff perceptions in this
area.
3. An evaluation of the efforts made by the Crown Office
and Procurator Fiscal Service to reach out to minority
ethnic communities in Scotland and to reflect their
concerns in forming prosecution policy.
4. An evaluation of the steps taken by the Department to
comply with the duties imposed upon it by the Race
Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 and in particular the duty
to promote good race relations.
Method of Working
To assist in the preparation of the report a Reference
Group was created consisting of persons and organisations
with expertise in the field. The membership list is
contained in
Appendix A.
I would like to record my gratitude to the members of
the Reference Group for the unstinting support and advice
they gave to the Inspectorate Team and without whose
assistance this report would not have been possible. The
conclusions, recommendations etc remain, however, that of
the Inspectorate.
Information was gathered initially from the considerable
volume of policy and other documents created by the
Department.
Interviews were held on a frequent basis with members of
the Crown Office Race (now Diversity) Team and again I
would like to record my thanks to those members of staff
who dealt patiently and courteously with all our requests
despite heavy demands on their time.
Although every effort was made to adopt scientific
approaches to the work including the design of
questionnaires inevitably there were limitations to the
methodology. However, the approach always was that no
conclusion or recommendation would be made without being
based on evidence, this being in line with the philosophy
of all inspectorates.
A large number of individual interviews took place with
the Solicitor General, members of the Service and various
outsiders.
A considerable number of meetings were held with groups
including Racial Equality Councils, religious groups and
other organisations with a strong interest in the subject
matter. A list of these is contained in
Appendix B.
Questionnaires were used to a considerable extent
especially in relation to interpreters. Again my thanks go
to the various firms who agreed to send out questionnaires
to interpreters on our behalf.
Questionnaires were also used in an effort to reach
users of the services of the West of Scotland Racial
Equality Council (WSREC) and my thanks go to the management
of WSREC for facilitating this contact.
The philosophy was to target people who had by
definition sought assistance with problems in the race
arena.
Other Racial Equality Councils throughout the country
also gave us their time and arranged focus meetings for us.
A sub-group of the Inspectorate and Reference Group
travelled to Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh and Ayrshire to
try to obtain a nationwide picture of the issues involved.
The Inspectorate Team was conscious that the problems in
rural areas might be quite different from urban areas.
Of particular importance was interviews held in courts
in different parts of the country where a witness or victim
who required the services of an interpreter was cited. This
gave invaluable first hand insight into the experiences of
individual victims and witnesses and also the experience of
the interpreters involved. Many of the problems encountered
can only be resolved by a joined up, cross cutting approach
and such an approach was already being adopted by various
agencies in the criminal justice system and is referred to
in the Chapter on Interpreters.
In an attempt to meet as wide an audience as possible a
radio interview was given by the Chief Inspector and a
member of the Reference Group in Glasgow in the form of a
phone in programme on a minority ethnic radio station.
On the staff front minority ethnic staff were invited to
contact the Inspectorate with their views. Questionnaires
were prepared for this purpose, advertised on the
Departmental Intranet and sent to minority ethnic
staff.
Dr Jandoo's criticisms were taken as a starting point
and an assessment made of the extent to which the
Department had responded and these are contained in the
various chapters of the report.
Dr Jandoo's 8
th recommendation was that the Crown Office
Inspectorate should conduct a thematic inspection of the
Service's response on victim and witness issues (including
the operation of the Victim Information and Advice
Division). This will be the second work of the Inspectorate
to be published next year.
Some of Dr Jandoo's recommendations fall more easily to
be examined in the wider context of victims and witnesses
generally including the treatment of next of kin and
although we have touched on some of these in this report,
including a particular Fatal Accident Inquiry and a
particular murder, they will be dealt with in more detail
in our second report.
Finally an overview was attempted in relation to the
Department's compliance with the Race Relations (Amendment)
Act 2000 and the creation of the Race Equality Scheme and
Race Equality Action Plan and also performance against the
Jandoo Action Plan created by the Department following Dr
Jandoo's report.
The Inspectorate is committed in line with current
thinking on inspection to seek to achieve improvements, to
identify good practice and to take a consumer's perspective
on service delivery.
Joseph T O'Donnell
Chief Inspector
November 2004
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