My vision of how Scotland can change the way the world treats female offenders

I want us to be bolder and take a more ambitious approach in Scotland.

In my view, we must be smarter with the choices we make and be more sophisticated in the way in which we deal with female offenders. But most importantly - we need to act on the evidence.

We know that women in prison have very different needs to their male counterparts and require very specific support. We also know that women offenders are far less likely to be a danger to the public compared with men.

We know too that the children of female offenders often go off the rails and offend themselves when their mothers are jailed miles away from home. This simply turns into a vicious circle, affecting future generations, and it is doing nothing to address reoffending. We need to turn the tide and do something about what we are seeing in our communities. The time for action is now.

I want to transform services for women so that we can help them break the cycle of reoffending and they can start making a positive contribution to society.

We need to tackle the inequalities which exist in our justice system and Scotland's communities head on and we need to stay true to the evidence, focussing on what works.

Over the last couple of months, we have been undertaking a period of extensive engagement with key partners with a view to developing a more radical set of options for Scotland to implement. We want to move to investing in smaller regional and community-based custodial facilities across the country. The response we've had so far from people and organisations across the country to the consultation has been extremely positive and there's been a real enthusiasm to get involved to ensure Scotland gets its new approach right.

We've already got some fantastic and very successful initiatives in place in Scotland which serve as a solid base to build on. Community based alternatives to custody, like 218 in Glasgow, ensure that links to the family and community can be maintained, whilst targeted work is undertaken to address the specific issue which is fuelling the crime such as alcohol, drugs or mental health issues.

Many of the women using the service have a range of complex needs such as addiction, poor mental or physical health and trauma issues. Many are victims of domestic abuse. By addressing these underlying issues, it reduces the likelihood of them reoffending in future. These kind of approaches are key.

But if we are to be as ambitious as we want to be, it is clear we also need to look beyond our own shores and set our sights on gathering the best possible international evidence available and learn from the successful approaches that other progressive countries in the world are taking.

Next week, our work reaches a crucial phase.

On Thursday, experts from across the world arrive in Scotland to share their experiences and make recommendations on the type of approaches we can take. Representatives from as far afield as Denmark, Sweden, Holland, Canada and Australia will be present.

These are countries who have won praise for adopting bold and progressive ways of dealing with women in prison and next week their experts will help shape a new strategy for the justice system in Scotland.

We want to consider adopting the best international approaches which work - and also to learn from them about what doesn't work. But this international summit is about more than that. It gives Scotland the chance to be a leader of change.

The active involvement of such a high calibre of international experts represents a unique opportunity to set Scotland on the path to building the most progressive justice system in Europe.

I am keen to grasp that opportunity.