Scotparl Justice Committee on males in women's prisons - live now

[ArabellaScott]

www.scottishparliament.tv/meeting/criminal-justice-committee-february-22-2023

Sorry, Scotparl Criminal Justice Committee.

It's tense!

Ah, seems I've missed the first part of the session, which was:

'1. Transgender prisoners and Scottish prisons: The Committee will take evidence from—
Keith Brown, Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Veterans, and Neil Rennick, Director of Justice, Scottish Government;
Teresa Medhurst, Chief Executive, and Jim Kerr, Interim Deputy Chief Executive, Scottish Prison Service.'

Up next:

'. Subordinate legislation: The Committee will take evidence on the Parole Board (Scotland) Rules 2022 from—
Keith Brown, Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Veterans, Sandra Wallace, Parole Policy Manager, and Nicholas Duffy, Senior Principal Legal Officer, Scottish Government.'

Thank you - I had a coffee watching the prison woman waffle and Pauline McNeil insist on an answer. Asking the obvious question like "who signed it off?" is refreshing to see. The prison woman is sweating and she should be ashamed of herself and her service.

They cared more about the rapist than the women. Prison woman should just say that and then we can move onto "lessons learned" which should be "sack anyone who says "won't somebody think about the rapists?""

A quick clip here of Russell Finlay (Conservative MSP) asking Keith Forbes (justice sec) about Isla Bryson's being a man or a woman.

www.scottishparliament.tv/meeting/criminal-justice-committee-february-22-2023/embed?clip_start=09:15:32&clip_end=09:18:10

Well that was the most weasely evasive bunch of circular answers I've heard in ages

Does anyone know who is the lady in the grey dress seated to the right (his left) of the weasel in the above clip? She seemed to have no time for his shtick.

What’s a woman? Is increasingly the kryptonite question innit?

It is Kate Coleman behind Brown!

@ NoXYinXXprisons

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-64729029

'Asked if she felt it was "appropriate" to house a rapist in the women's estate, Ms Medhurst said: "It's not a simple process and at the point of time where someone is making a decision on the location of an individual, they will have extremely limited information and make the best decision at that time, given both the circumstances and our policy position."

She added that criminals come to the prison service from courts with "not a lot of information", and the sharing of information could be improved on.'

You don't need to be a farmer to recognise bullshit.

@TenV thank you.

She joins a distinguished group of very smart women sitting through genderwoo speeches by idiots. See also : Helen Saxby and Layla Moran (seeing into souls!), and Maya and Helen J (sex isn't binary!) recently.

How do they do a risk assessment (which I thought they claim to do) if they only have access to "extremely limited information"?

@onlytherain they do that after they place them in the prison of their stated gender as per the 2014 policy (that NO women's groups were asked about only 1 trans charity)

My summary: 'So we had a bloke accused of rape who had/could have been kept in solitary in the male estate but, after the jury decided he was a rapist, we checked with head office and they agreed we should put him in a women's prison because the 2014 rules said we should believe it (for now) that he thinks he is a bit girly; ignore the vulnerable women?'

Did I miss something?

Absent an appropriate carrier pigeon or semaphore they didn't think to have a quick google?

@onlytherain How do they do a risk assessment (which I thought they claim to do) if they only have access to "extremely limited information"?

and the risk assessment is related only to the person accused of a crime and how much of a risk they will be at in prison, The risk to the women they are imprisoned with is NOT taken into account