Nicola Sturgeon has been accused of hypocrisy after she refused to rule out the automatic early release of prisoners, despite previously promising to do so. 

The SNP leader was pushed on past comments during First Minster’s Questions, with the Conservatives demanding clarity over new proposals which could see someone released after serving less than a third of their sentence.

Shadow Justice Secretary Jamie Greene - who was standing in for Douglas Ross after sickness forced the Tory leader to pull out at the last minute - pointed out that in 2015 the First Minister said the government’s objective “remains to end the policy of automatic early release as soon as we are able to”.

However, a Scottish Government consultation looking at different measures to reduce the prison population includes plans for offenders serving four years or less to be automatically released earlier than the current half-way point of their sentence.

Longer-term prisoners could also be brought before the parole board after serving one-third of their jail time.

"So what’s changed?" Mr Greene asked. "The system that the First Minister now presides over is stacked against victims from the very start.”

The Tory MSP also hit out at the courts backlog, which is predicted to take until 2026 to relieve, saying one victim of domestic abuse saw her court date delayed 18 times over three years.

“She told us that ‘this now feels like court-sanctioned abuse’,” he said.

“It’s a shocking case, but she’s not the only one.”

Mr Green told MSPs: “Of course, Covid made it worse, but let me tell you there were tens of thousands of cases in that backlog before Covid even started so it cannot be used as an excuse,” he said.

His question came after a new report revealed that some victims of sexual assault have dropped their cases and others are considering withdrawing from the justice system due to delays.

In the report for the Scottish Government’s Victims Taskforce, Rape Crisis Scotland said six sexual offence complainers it is supporting have withdrawn due to delays, while 43 complainers being assisted by the Rape Crisis National Advocacy Project have considered withdrawing from the criminal justice process because of the impact of delays.

"First Minister, is justice for the victims of crime even a priority for this government anymore?" Mr Greene asked.

In response, Sturgeon said: “There is a serious backlog caused, and certainly exacerbated, by Covid in our court service and we are very focused with the court service and the wider justice community in addressing that, and I know everybody who works in our courts service, everybody who works in the Crown Office, is very seized of the importance of prioritising domestic abuse and violence against women and children cases.

“These are very serious cases and I absolutely recognise that.

“That is why we have invested in the recovery fund, that is why in the Budget we are increasing the resources available to the courts service so that they can tackle that backlog.”

"Covid has made this worse - but there were tens of thousands of court cases awaiting trial before the pandemic began, so it can't be used as an excuse.

“We are investing in a recovery fund investing more than £50 million to tackle the backlog caused by covid.

"We'll continue to work with the court service and indeed the whole justice community to do that.

"Let me go back to the issue of early release because I think the Tory hypocrisy on this utterly breathtaking and let me set out why.

"Back in 2016 this government reformed release arrangements for prisoners serving long term sentences. What that meant was that the most dangerous prisoners no longer received automatic early release and that ended a system that was introduced by a Tory UK Government in 1993.

"So that's the background. Why do I think the Tory position is hypocritical today is because when we did that, in 2016, the Tories in this chamber voted against that change.

"They voted against that change that scrapped automatically early release for the most dangerous long term prisoners and that change is not affected by the proposals that we have consulted on.

Greene replied: "The only hypocrisy in this chamber today is the First Minister who said, on record, that she would end automatic early release and now refuses to rule out letting people out of prison after just a third of their sentence."

He also probed Ms Sturgeon on the IT glitch that meant eight prisoners with life sentences were allowed temporary release after being given the wrong risk assessment score.

The First Minister said seven of the eight prisoners were still in custody.

She said: “Because first grant of temporary release is not final release, it is about allowing some form of limited access to the community for the first time.”