Children and vulnerable adults who are witnesses in legal cases will be able to submit recorded evidence rather than appear in court after the opening of a dedicated Glasgow centre.
Justice minister Humza Yousaf hailed the move as a “quiet revolution”, while charity Children 1st hailed it as a major step forward to ensuring access to justice for young people.
The Evidence and Hearings Suite is designed to protect child complainers and witnesses in cases of sexual crime and domestic violence, enabling them to feel more confident to give evidence well and ultimately making it more likely justice is done. Similar venues are planned for Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Inverness.
At its launch, Lord Justice Clerk Lady Dorrian said the centre– the first of its type in the UK – would tackle two problems with the current system of giving evidence. “Those are the potential to retraumatise the witness and the fact that courts are not at all conducive of some witnesses giving true, accurate and reliable evidence,” she said. The goal is to get the best possible evidence, she said: “You do not get that by placing children in rooms with lofty ceilings surrounded by strange adults in gowns and wigs or uncomfortable furniture designed best suited for adults.”
The vulnerable witnesses suite will become the default approach to taking evidence from children, with their accounts heard by a judge and recorded using high definition cameras which allow a jury to assess their demeanour as well as what they say. Prosecution and defence lawyers will be able to cross-examine witnesses during recording sessions.
However the centre is designed to be child-friendly and calming, with a room for witnesses to take a break, and a sensory room. It will begin being used for child witnesses by January or sooner, and will eventually also provide similar services for adult witnesses who are deemed vulnerable.
Anna O’Reilly, assistant director of Children1st said the difference it would make could not be overstated: “Children and families tell us attending court has had a very negative impact on their health and wellbeing as well as their experience of giving evidence,” she said. “They will no longer be at risk of meeting the accused, it will reduce the time they have to wait to give evidence and make the process far less stressful.”
Ms O’Reilly gave a series of examples of children the charity has worked with, including a girl whose case was postponed five times leaving her unable to sleep for months, a boy who met his father over lunch at court, rendering him unable to give evidence, and an eight year old girl who had to endure a series of setbacks including a fight in the waiting room.
She said the hope ultimately was for a ‘Bairn’s Hoose’, based on the Barnhaus model in use in Scandinavia and Iceland to support child witnesses.
Mr Yousaf said the Scottish Government supported this proposal in the longer term. In the meantime he said the new centre would make the judicial system more humane. “We should never lose sight of the fact that we are dealing with vulnerable people and children who are often dealing with an element of trauma. With this centre we can ensure we don’t compound that,” he said.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel