Interview: Kenny MacAskill is keen to deny that criticisms of his political opponents and the label of �soft-touch Scotland� are getting to him.
Kenny MacAskill is keen to deny that criticisms of his political opponents and the label of "soft-touch Scotland" are getting to him.
He said their words did not bother him, but his pent-up frustration at the tirade of abuse which today's announcement on sentence reform will inevitably bring is hard to conceal.
Almost six months since the publication of Henry McLeish's commission into prisons, the Justice Secretary will lay out his response to the Scottish Parliament later today.
The choice set out by the McLeish report was stark: either spend hundreds of millions on new prisons for the burgeoning population, or invest in community penalties which work and cut short sentences. Mr MacAskill has chosen the more difficult path.
Under the proposals he will outline, sheriffs will only be able to hand out prison sentences of six months or less if they state the reasons why.
Community service orders will be replaced by new community penalties, which include "payback" and rehabilitation and will be issued on the day of sentencing rather than weeks or months later.
Those on the revamped community service will also be tracked through progress courts, allowing sheriffs to check on their adherence. There will be a "presumption" against short-term imprisonment in favour of faster, tougher community sentences.
The aim of the package is to curb Scotland's high levels of reoffending and end the use of sentences which are too short to allow for any element of rehabilitation.
Political opponents are expected to criticise the move and some sheriffs have made clear they would see it as interference with the independence of the judiciary.
But speaking exclusively to The Herald, Mr MacAskill was undaunted. "We will be making clear that custodial sentences of six months or less should not come in unless there is good reason and you state that for the record," he said.
"People should know why a custodial sentence has been given - not just for the benefit of the accused, but for the benefit of our community. If you want to give a sentence of six months or less, you will have to say why."
A draft bill is expected to go before parliament early next year to enforce the move, which could affect thousands of offenders. In 2006-07, 14,686 offenders were sentenced to six months or less. Statistics indicate that the shorter the sentence and younger the offender, the more likely the person is to reoffend.
Mr MacAskill was well aware that he would be criticised by some MSPs but was adamant that reforms should be based on what works.
"All the evidence shows that a tough community sentence or addressing underlying addiction problem can break the cycle of reoffending," he said with characteristic energy.
"Three-quarters of those released from a custodial sentence reoffend within the following two years, and two-fifths of those given community sentences don't. This is about breaking the cycle of petty offending.
"It is about making community sentences quicker and keeping people on a tighter leash. If people refuse to accept the court sentence or undertake the necessary payback, then to prison they will go."
Mr MacAskill also revealed that he wanted to make far greater use of tagging as an alternative to prison, rather than at the end of inmates' custodial sentences under home detention curfew.
There are currently 7801 offenders behind bars in Scotland and 391 out on a tag under the curfew scheme. Currently, certain lower risk prisoners are released from prison early on the condition that they remain at home during stipulated hours.
"There does seem to us some logical reason that curfewing might be better at an earlier juncture," he said. "Do we believe it has a role to play? Yes.
"It would be much better to use it to prevent someone from going to prison in the first place, but we are where we are because of the situation we have inherited.
"We will seek to get to a situation where electronic monitoring is used to keep you out of prison, not to get you out, because it's been decided that you don't need to be in prison in the first place."
That change of direction is not only about what works, but what Scotland wants to spend its money on. Research shows that six months in prison costs more than 10 times as much as a community service order.
When Cathy Jamieson, the Labour MSP, took over the justice portfolio in 2003, she pledged to reduce Scotland's burgeoning prison population and launched a consultation on the use of prison - making clear that community sentences were more effective and cheaper.
At that stage, the average daily prison population was 6524. Last year, it reached 7700. Earlier this year, the daily prison population reached a record high of 8137 and the prison service warned that jails were in a state of "crisis" and had exceeded safe limits.
Despite their stance in 2003, Labour and the Tories are expected to condemn today's proposals.
However, as Mr MacAskill said: "We can't go on as we are. Our prisons are fit to burst.
"This is about allowing us the flexibility to deal with the serious offenders in prison and allowing the petty offenders to repay the damage they have caused.
"The bottom line is that if we don't do this, what do we do? We have already signed off more prisons but if you are building more prisons you are not building hospitals, schools, and homes. Prison is not free."
Scotland, The Herald revealed earlier this week, sends more of its people to prison on a daily basis than any other country in Europe, including Russia, Moldova, and Turkey. It spends more than £280m a year on locking people up.
Many academics and those involved in the McLeish commission are expected to welcome today's proposals, but questions remain about how they will be paid for when so many people are still being locked up.
Mr MacAskill talked of "direction of change" and the need to turn around "the tanker" which is the current system, but it is unclear whether there will be any additional funding other than the £1m for community service announced last month.
"Without the resources they are not going to be able to run the new progress courts in a way that will satisfy the judiciary and the public," said Professor Fergus McNeill of Strathclyde University.
"There is an anxiety that even a well-informed reform such as this will not work without adequate resources and that these good ideas could be devalued."
